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PRINCETON,  N.  J. 


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Purchased   by  the   Hamill   Missionary  Fund, 


BV  2030  .C2  1904 
A  Call  to  advance 


A  Call  to  Advance 


A  Call  to  Advance 


Addresses  delivered  before  the 
Eastern  Missionary  Conven- 
tion of  the  Methodist  Epis- 
copal Church,  Philadelphia, 
Pa.,     October     13-15,      1903 

^"' 


NEW     YORK:     EATON     &     MAINS 
CINCINNATI:  JENNINGS   &    PYE 


The  Philadelphia  Convention  Addresses  are  pub- 
lished in  a  series  of  seven  small  volumes,  of 
which  this  is  one.     The  volumes  are  entitled: 

A  CALL  TO  ADVANCE 

MISSIONS  AND  WORLD  MOVEMENTS 

THE  ASIATIC  FIELDS 

THE  AFRICAN,  EUROPEAN,  AND 
LATIN  AMERICAN  FIELDS 

GENERAL  SURVEY  AND  HOME  FIELDS 

YOUNG  PEOPLE  AND  MISSIONS 

THE  MISSIONARY  WORKSHOP 


Copyright,  1904,  by 
Eaton  &  Mains 


CONTENTS. 


PAGE 

I.  The  Conversion  p/^THE  World.  .     7 
Bishop  Cyrus  D,  Foss,  D.D. 

II.   The  New  Era  OF^issiONS 23 

Bishop  James  M.  Thoburn,  D.D. 

III.  Go  OR  Send!  . . .  .^X^ 47 

Rev.  William  F.  McDowell,  D.D. 

IV.  The  Right  of  Jesu;?^o  Reign.  . .   63 

Bishop  Warren  A.  Candler,  D.D. 


A  Call  to  Advance. 


I. 

THE    CONVERSION    OF    THE 
WORLD. 

By  BISHOP  CYRUS  D.   FOSS,  D.D. 

The  magnificent  manifesto  of  the  just- 
ascending  Saviour  sometimes  brings  to 
thoughtful  minds  and  consecrated  hearts  a 
sense  of  discouragement,  amounting  almost 
to  despair.  ''Go  ye  into  all  the  world,  and 
preach  the  Gospel  to  every  creature."  To 
what  extent  has  that  irrepealable  marching 
order  been  obeyed?  Almost  nineteen  hun- 
dred years  have  passed  and  yet  not  one 
half  the  adult  population  of  the  globe  has 
ever  opened  a  Bible  or  heard  a  Gospel  ser- 
mon,   and   the    Church    itself    is    not   half 

7 


A  Cai.1.  to  Advance;. 

awake.  Probably  a  majority  of  the  mem- 
bers of  the  whole  Church  on  earth  care  lit- 
tle or  nothing  about  the  missionary  move- 
ment; as  is  shown  by  the  fact  that  they 
give  nothing  to  it,  unless  it  may  be  a  chance 
penny,  and  if  absent  from  the  collection 
bring  nothing  afterward.  Moreover  it 
takes  an  argument  to  show  that  any  land 
called  "Christian"  fairly  deserves  that  name ; 
and  many  of  the  vilest  vices  and  crimes 
abound  under  the  shadows  of  church  spires. 

"The  Morning  Cometh." 

But  I  will  not  suffer  myself  to  march  in 
the  motley  and  croaking  ranks  of  pessimism 
for  the  whole  of  a  single  minute.  ''The 
morning  cometh."  It  is  comforting  to  note 
that  good  men  in  every  age  have  groaned 
under  the  oppressive  evils  of  their  times, 
even  while  lured  forward  by  splendid  ideals. 
Among  the  twelve  apostles  there  was  one 
"devil."     The  Epistles  of  the  New  Testa- 

8 


The;  Conve:rsion  of  the  World. 

ment  are  very  largely  taken  up  with  re- 
bukes of  the  heresies  and  sins  of  the  apos- 
tolic Church. 

John  Wesley,  at  the  age  of  sixty-three, 
when  Great  Britain  was  looking  with  amaze- 
ment on  the  glorious  evangelistic  successes 
achieved  by  him  and  his  helpers,  wrote  thus 
of  himself  and  his  followers :  "They  ought 
to  be  both  burning  and  shining  lights ;  but 
they  neither  burn  nor  shine.  Three  or  four 
of  our  preachers  in  Ireland  are  truly  de- 
voted men,  so  are  a  few  of  the  preachers  in 
England.  Si  sic  omnes.  (O,  that  all  were 
such!)  What  would  be  able  to  stand  be- 
fore them  ?"  Concerning  himself  he  wrote : 
''I  am  ashamed  of  my  indolence  and  inac- 
tivity. What  have  I  been  doing  these  thirty 
years?"  The  trouble  was  that  his  ideal  out- 
ran him. 

"The  morning  cometh."  I  know  the  pessi- 
mist denies  this.  Well  the  raven — the  first 
bird  mentioned  in  the  Bible  and  the  least 

9 


A  Cai.1.  to  Advance. 

admirable — has  human  prototypes  which 
croak  out  for  evermore :  "Morning?  There 
is  no  morning.  Night  sits  on  the  throne, 
and  eternal  darkness  is  at  hand.  The  world 
has  gone  to  the  bad.  Politics  are  corrupt. 
The  morals  of  the  people  go  from  worse  to 
worst.  Religion  is  losing  its  hold."  Well, 
if  that  be  true,  there  must  be  a  dreadful 
mistake  somewhere,  for  I  hear  Solomon  say, 
"The  path  of  the  just  is  as  a  shining  light, 
which  shineth  more  and  more  unto  the  per- 
fect day."  I  hear  David  say,  "Thy  kingdom 
is  an  everlasting  kingdom,  and  thy  dominion 
endureth  throughout  all  generations."  I 
hear  Isaiah  cry,  "He  shall  not  fail  nor  be 
discouraged  until  he  have  set  judgment  in 
the  earth;  and  the  isles  shall  wait  for  his 
law."  At  length  I  hear  the  angels  sing: 
"I  bring  you  tidings  of  great  joy,  which 
shall  be  to  all  people.  Glory  to  God  in  the 
highest  and  on  earth  peace,  good  will  to 
men;"  and  I  hear  Jesus  say,  "Go  ye  into 

lo 


The:  Conve:rsion  oi^  th^  World. 

all  the  world,  and  preach  the  Gospel  to  every 
creature."  O,  pessimist,  you  must  excuse 
me  if  I  accept  the  word  of  Solomon,  and 
of  David,  and  of  Isaiah,  and  of  the  angels, 
and  of  Jesus,  rather  than  your  word.  "The 
morning  cometh!" 

Christian  Progre:ss  in  Genkrai.. 

Consider  the  general  progress  of  the 
kingdom  of  Christ  in  the  earth.  I  know 
very  well  that  some  doctrinaires  attempt  to 
show  that  civilization  has  made  the  changes 
I  am  going  to  speak  of,  and  rather  than 
argue  with  them,  I  just  quote  the  words  of 
two  men,  certainly  neither  of  them  religious 
bigots,  and  both  of  them  great  thinkers — 
Mr.  Froude  and  Mr.  Carlyle.  Mr.  Froude 
says,  "All  that  we  call  modern  civilization 
in  a  sense  which  deserves  the  name,  is  the 
visible  expression  of  the  transforming 
power  of  the  Gospel."     Mr.  Carlyle  says, 

"The  Christian  religion  must  ever  be  re- 

II 


A  Cali.  to  Advance. 

garded  as  the  crowning  glory,  or  rather  the 
Hfe  and  soul,  of  our  whole  modern  culture.'' 
These  are  not  religious  bigots,  but  profound, 
philosophic  students  of  history.  Let  me,  in 
the  light  of  such  characterizations,  give  you 
just  a  glance  and  hint  at  the  numerical  prog- 
ress of  the  Christian  religion.  I  speak  now 
of  its  adherents,  not  of  communicants  alone 
of  Christian  Churches,  but  of  those  who  be- 
lieve in  Christianity  rather  than  some  other 
religion.  The  figures  I  give  you  are  be- 
lieved to  be  substantially  accurate.  At  the 
end  of  the  first  century  there  were  five  mil- 
lion Christian  believers;  at  the  end  of  the 
tenth,  fifty  millions;  at  the  end  of  the  fif- 
teenth, one  hundred  millions ;  at  the  end  of 
the  eighteenth,  two  hundred  millions ;  at  the 
end  of  the  nineteenth,  five  hundred  millions ; 
so  that  the  number  has  more  than  doubled 
within  a  century.  Did  you  hear  that  state- 
ment ?  The  number  of  people  on  'this  earth 
who  profess  their  belief  in  Christianity  has 

12 


The:  CoNVi^RSiON  oi''  the;  World. 

more  than  doubled  within  a  century.  Still 
further,  one  third  of  the  world's  population 
gOA^erns  two  thirds  of  its  people;  that  is,  it 
is  the  Christian  nations  which  are  the  brainy 
nations,  the  wealthy  nations,  the  ruling  na- 
tions, the  progressive  nations  of  the  world 
to-day. 

But  we  have  for  our  encouragement  not 
only  a  vast  array  of  facts,  as  incontestable 
as  the  law  of  gravitation  or  the  granite  foun- 
dations of  the  globe;  we  have  also  an  im- 
mense treasury  of  ideas  and  forces.  Of 
these  I  can  glance  at  only  a  few :  enthusiasm 
for  the  truth;  the  fullness  of  the  dispensa- 
tion of  the  Holy  Spirit;  the  demonstrated 
power  of  the  Gospel  to  save  men  of  all 
races,  climes,  and  grades  of  intellectual  cul- 
ture ;  the  recent  very  glowing  and  now  mag- 
nificent apprehension  by  the  world  at  large 
of  the  glory  of  the  personality  of  Jesus 
Christ,  and  the  pre-eminence  accorded  him 
in  all  theological  belief  and  in  all  moral 

13 


A  Cali.  to  Advance. 

ideals  of  men  who  have  any  faith  about  re- 
ligion at  all ;  the  multiplication  of  Bibles, 
so  that  in  a  single  year  more  have  been  set 
going  in  the  world  than  existed  in  the  first 
year  of  the  last  century;  the  rise  and  won- 
derful progress  of  the  Sunday  school ;  the 
multiplication  of  religious  literature;  the 
numerous  Young  Men's  and  Young 
Women's  Christian  Associations,  and  of 
young  people's  societies  in  almost  all 
branches  of  the  Church,  and  the  magnifi- 
cent and  growing  recognition  of  the  work 
of  women  in  the  Church,  and  in  philan- 
thropy and  in  moral  reform.  These  are 
hints  at  the  resources,  in  ideas  and  in  dem- 
onstrated truths,  which  are  now  the  solid 
foundations  of  the  whole  work  and  out- 
march of  the  Christian  Church. 

Th^  Missionary  Ce^ntury. 

As  to  strictly  missionary  work  and  prog- 
ress a  few  words  must  suffice.     In  secular 

14 


The  Conversion  o^  the  World. 

history  the  last  century  is  recorded  as  the 
"Century  of  Science."  In  the  profounder 
sacred  history,  which  is  concerned  with  the 
world's  real  progress  toward  its  grandest 
destiny,  the  nineteenth  century  must  ever 
stand  as  the  great  ''Century  of  Evangeliza- 
tion," the  century  in  which  twenty  times  as 
much  was  done  for  the  spread  of  the  Gospel 
in  heathen  lands  as  in  all  the  other  centuries 
put  together.  One  hundred  years  ago  in  the 
whole  heathen  world  there  were  about  one 
hundred  ordained  ministers  and  not  a  single 
native  helper;  now  there  are  ten  thousand 
ordained  ministers  and  seventy  thousand  na- 
tive helpers.  Then  there  were  only  a  few 
scores  of  native  communicants;  now  more 
than  a  million  and  a  half.  The  old,  ever- 
new  Bible  has  been  found  to  answer  all 
needs  in  all  lands.  Converts  are  raised  up 
everywhere  ready  to  stand  the  supreme  test 
of  martyrdom.  Missions  have  won  the  high 
encomiums  of  generals  and  admirals  and 

15 


A  Cai.1.  to  Advance;. 

governors  and  philosophic  tourists,  whose 
predecessors  fifty  years  ago  laughed  them 
to  scorn.  Even  Darwin,  after  his  famous 
tour  around  the  world,  declared  that,  "The 
lesson  of  the  missionary  is  the  enchanter's 
wand." 

Meanwhile  the  Church  has  been  slowly 
awakening  from  its  long-continued  and  as- 
tonishing slumber.  Missionary  societies 
have  been  multiplied  until  every  branch  of 
the  Evangelical  Church  has  organized  its 
forces  in  the  sublime  effort  to  evangelize 
and  convert  the  whole  world  at  home  and 
abroad.  In  this  lofty  endeavor  the  Church 
is  coming  more  and  more  to  a  solemn  real- 
ization of  the  actual  presence  and  measure- 
less resources  of  the  Holy  Ghost. 

The:  Embarrassment  oip  Success. 
As    Methodists    vvc    have    in    late    years 
found   our   splendid   evangelistic   successes 
our  greatest  embarrassment.   Converts  were 

i6 


The  Conversion  oi^  the  World. 

multiplied  and  scores  of  thousands  more 
were  ready  to  come  to  baptism,  but  we  had 
to  cry  to  them,  ''Stand  back,"  and  two 
years  ago  we  were  actually  obliged  to  cut 
our  appropriations  for  missionary  work  eight 
per  cent.  But  a  brighter  day  has  dawned. 
In  our  agony  we  called  mightily  upon  God 
and  were  moved  to  organize  this  Open  Door 
Emergency  Commission.  The  next  year 
the  collections  were  increased  $112,000. 
Last  October  in  Cleveland  for  four  days 
many  of  us  felt  such  a  breath  of  Pentecost 
as  never  before.  In  one  evening  contribu- 
tions, to  be  distinctly  over  and  above  all  reg- 
ular offerings,  were  piled  upon  God's  altar 
to  the  extent  of  $302,000.  And  now,  in 
this  Philadelphia  Convention,  we  are  come 
to  wait  together  for  three  days  on  the 
Mount  of  Vision.  God  grant  that  this  gath- 
ering may  prove  to  be  under  augmented  in- 
fluences of  the  same  ever-blessed  Holy 
Ghost. 

2  17 


A  Cai.Iv  to  Advanci^. 

A  ParabIvE  01?  Powe:r. 
Permit  me  a  parable,  for  so  my  Lord 
spoke.  From  creation's  dawn  till  now  the 
greatest  of  forces  has  been  challenging 
man's  attention.  Its  flashing,  bellowing 
cannonade  in  every  storm  has  summoned 
him  to  harness  and  to  use  its  infinite  ener- 
gies. One  hundred  and  forty-nine  years 
ago  last  June,  after  long  study  and  numer- 
ous experiments,  Benjamin  Franklin  came 
to  think  the  lightning  in  the  sky  identical 
with  the  electricity  excited  by  rubbing  a 
plate  of  glass.  He  waited  long  for  some  tall 
steeple  to  lift  him  near  the  clouds,  to  test 
his  theory ;  but  steeples  came  slowly  in  this 
Quaker  town,  so  he  made  a  kite  and  got  a 
boy  to  help  him  fly  it  when  the  next  thun- 
derstorm appeared.  He  suspended  a  key 
from  the  string  near  his  hand,  and  secured 
the  insulation  of  his  novel  battery  by  a  few 
inches  of  silken  cord.     Presently  the  little 

i8 


The;  Conversion  oi?  THf;  Wori.d. 

filaments  of  the  kite  string  stood  out  and 
were  agitated.  His  eyes  almost  leaped  from 
their  sockets.  He  held  his  knuckle  to  the 
key  and  got  a  spark  and  then  charged  a 
Ley  den  jar ;  and  told  the  world  that  light- 
ning and  electricity  were  identical. 

Slowly  the  great  science  developed  for 
more  than  a  hundred  years,  and  it  is  chiefly 
within  the  last  twenty  years  that  the  giant 
of  all  forces  has  been  harnessed  and  set  to 
work.  Let  us  leap  the  chasm  from  Frank- 
lin till  now. 

Two  weeks  ago  I  passed  Niagara  Falls. 
The  train  stopped  five  minutes  on  the  brink 
of  the  descending  flood,  and  I  feasted  my 
soul  once  more  with  the  subduing  beauty 
and  majestic  music  of  the  King  of  Cata- 
racts. Just  beyond  the  boiling  flood  was  the 
immense  electrical  power  house  in  which 
35,000-horse  power  of  the  10,000,000-horse 
power  of  Niagara  is  harnessed  for  the 
use  of  man.     It  lights  the  city  of  Buffalo, 

19 


A  Cai.1,  to  Advance:. 

twenty  miles  away,  runs  its  trolley  cars  and 
factories,  and  reaches  out  tireless  hands  of 
help  to  many  other  towns.  Moreover  its 
by-products  are  of  immense  value.  Some  of 
them  are  new  to  science,  such  as  carborun- 
dum; and  others  vastly  cheapened,  such  as 
aluminum,  bleaching  powder,  and  calcium 
carbide,  the  basis  of  acetylene  gas. 

My  Lord  himself  suddenly  turned  all  this 
into  a  parable  for  me.  As  I  stood  there 
looking  at  that  power  house  the  descending 
sun  broke  forth  and  touched  the  mist;  and 
lo,  a  glorious  rainbow  leaped  halfway  from 
flood  to  zenith.  It  spoke  to  me  and  said, 
''God  is  here,  and  God  is  love."  It  told  me 
other  things.  It  said  all  this  power  is  but 
a  faint  hint  of  the  unimaginable  and  abso- 
lutely infinite  storehouses  of  power  at  the 
disposal  of  the  Church  of  God  for  the  sal- 
vation of  the  world. 

The  divine-human  King  of  all  worlds, 
just  before  he  disappeared  from  man's  sight 

20 


The:  Conversion  o?  thi;  Wori.d. 

in  this  world  that  he  might  become  omni- 
present in  it,  gave  forth  the  great  command 
to  be  everywhere  obeyed,  "Go  ye  into  all  the 
world,  and  preach  the  Gospel  to  every  crea- 
ture." He  flanked  that  command  with  his 
almighty  power  and  his  perpetual  presence. 
Before  it,  "AH  power  is  given  unto  me  in 
heaven  and  in  earth;"  and  after  it,  "Lo,  I 
am  with  you  alway,  even  unto  the  end  of  the 
world." 

Strong-winged  Faith. 

My  faith  takes  wing,  not  alone  here  on, 
this  platform  ;  it  has  done  so  hundreds  of 
times  in  private  pra}'er  and  in  meditation  on 
the  great  things  of  the  kingdom.  My  faith 
takes  wing  and  says,  the  resources  are  so 
ample ;  the  wealth  within  the  Christian 
Church  now  is  so  vast,  if  only  it  were  con- 
secrated for  the  work  God  has  for  it  to  do ; 
the  real  deep  sentiments  and  beliefs  and  lives 
of  Christian  people  are  now  so  mighty,  if 
they   could   come   to   the   front   and  assert 

21 


A  CaIvI.  to  Advance;. 

themselves  always  and  not  be  overpowered 
by  the  chill  of  sin  and  of  unbelief;  the  re- 
sources of  intellectual  culture  through  the 
schools  and  colleges  are  so  great ;  the  whole 
ecclesiastical  machinery  for  the  world's  sal- 
vation is  now  so  very  abundant  and  magnifi- 
cent, that  if  only  these  appliances  could  have 
a  new  baptism  of  the  Pentecost,  the  millen- 
nium might  come  in  a  decade. 

The  infinite  resources  of  the  Almighty 
God-man  put  at  the  disposal  of  the  Church 
for  the  evangelization  and  actual  conversion 
of  the  world — that  is  the  keynote  of  this 
Convention. 

22 


11. 

THE  NEW  ERA  OF  MISSIONS. 

by  bishop  james  m.  thoburn,  d.d. 

Steps  o^  Approach. 

In  almost  all  great  movements  among 
mankind  progress  is  marked  by  distinct 
stages.  The  missionary  enterprise  proves 
no  exception.  In  the  case  of  modern  mis- 
sions, which  took  their  rise  in  certain  parts 
of  Northern  Europe  and  especially  in  Ger- 
many, the  first  beginnings  were  very  feeble 
and  small  in  extent.  The  same  may  be 
noted  in  the  case  of  Great  Britain  and  of 
America.  Shortly  after  the  middle  of  the 
last  century  we  reach  what  might  be  termed 
a  definite  stage  of  advance.  It  was  an  era 
of  great  events,  so  far  as  missions  are  con- 
cerned. We  have  the  appearance  of  Doctor 
Livingstone  in  Central  Africa.     His  voice 

23 


A  Cai^Iv  to  Advance:. 

was  literally  the  voice  of  one  crying  in  the 
v^ilderness,  and  we  ought  to  be  proud  of 
him  as  a  missionary.  His  travels  and  his 
writings  have  affected  the  political  world 
as  well  as  the  moral  world.  He  was  one 
of  the  world's  great  men.  After  his  appear- 
ance, perhaps  the  next  great  event  to  be 
noted  was  the  abolition  of  American  slav- 
ery; then  followed  the  liberation  of  Mex- 
ico, and  after  that  came  Louis  Napoleon, 
and  he  was  followed  by  the  abolition  of  the 
temporal  power  of  the  Pope,  and  then  again 
by  the  liberation  of  Italy.  Meanwhile,  in 
the  Eastern  world,  Japan  had  made  her  ap- 
pearance among  the  nations  of  the  world, 
and  China  began  to  open  her  doors  anew. 
That  momentous  period  seems  to  have  been 
planned  in  the  interest  of  Christian  mis- 
sions. Everything  worked  for  us,  and  there 
was  no  weapon  in  the  hands  of  the  enemy 
that  they  could  use.  that  seemed  to  work 
against    us.     Thus    we    entered    upon    the 

24 


The;  Nkw  Missionary  Era. 

threshold  of  the  twentieth  century,  and  we 
find  that  we  are  confronted  by  new  circum- 
stances, new  practices,  new  responsibihties, 
and  a  new  state  of  affairs. 

A  Missionary  Contrast. 

I  remember  that  between  1859  and  1864 
I  spent  five  very  anxious  years.  They  were 
my  first  years  in  mission  service,  and  when 
I  returned  with  my  motherless  children  to 
this  country  the  people  asked  me  the  meas- 
ure of  success  that  I  had  had.  I  used  to 
feel  a  certain  measure  of  sinking  as  I 
thought  of  that  field  and  knew  that  I  had 
done  the  best  that  I  could  for  it,  but  it 
seemed  as  though  such  a  small  amount  of 
work  had  been  accomplished  in  five  years, 
for  I  had  baptized  in  that  time  only  five 
persons.  I  am  going  back  again  next  week, 
and  when  I  land  in  Bombay  I  shall  have  to 
choose  between  a  thousand  different  fields, 
all  of  which  will  be  reaching  out  for  me  to 

25 


A  Cai.1.  To  Advance:. 

come,  and  wherever  I  go  I  shall  find  con- 
verts waiting  for  baptism. 

Just  as  I  was  leaving  India  last  spring,  to 
come  to  the  United  States,  I  baptized  eight 
hundred  and  thirty-seven  persons  at  one 
meeting.  That  is  somewhat  different  from 
baptizing  five  persons  in  five  years.  If  I 
go  back  and  would  commence  to  baptize 
twenty-five  persons  a  day,  and  do  that  every 
day  for  three  hundred  and  sixty-five  days, 
I  should  not  then  exhaust  the  number  of 
candidates  that  are  waiting  to  acknowledge 
Christ  Jesus  as  their  Saviour  by  accepting 
the  rite  of  Christian  baptism.  That  is  the 
situation  to-day.  If  I  did  not  belong  in 
India,  and  I  were  to  go  down  into  another 
part  of  the  world,  I  would  find  that  God  had 
given  his  abundant  blessing  to  other  flour- 
ishing missions. 

I  might  go  on  and  call  attention  to  other 
open  doors,  but  I  have  mentioned  one  in- 
stance merely  to  show  that  this  is  a  remark- 

26 


The:  New  Missionary  Era. 

able  era,  and  that  the  present  era  calls  for 
some  very  special  action  on  our  part.  When 
we  receive  these  converts  we  should  prepare 
them  for  church  obligations,  and  some  one 
should  be  put  with  them  so  that  they  may 
be  adequately  trained.  They  must  be  taught 
to  write ;  they  must  be  taught  to  read ;  they 
must  receive  the  word;  and  their  children 
must  be  educated  as  the  parents  have  been, 
and  they  must  be  prepared  for  intellectual 
and  social  as  well  as  spiritual  progress.  We 
are  to  build  up  the  people  here,  there,  and 
yonder,  and  this  is  just  the  difference  be- 
tween the  modern  mission  field  and  the  old 

field. 

Breadth  oi^  the  Work. 

It  used  to  be  that  we  gathered  a  few 
people  in  a  few  villages,  and  we  had  a  very 
simple  conception  of  what  a  native  convert 
could  do  for  us.  I  know  a  great  many  peo- 
ple unwisely  seemed  very  much  afraid  of 
making  our  native  converts  too  intelligent. 


A  Cali,  to  Advance:. 

If  we  don't  cultivate  the  intellect  we  soon 
begin  to  find  that  the  Christian  growth  of 
the  individual  is  in  some  strange  way 
dwarfed.  We  must  give  them  culture. 
What  does  that  mean  ?  We  have  many  lan- 
guages. When  I  reached  India  the  first 
time  Dr.  Butler  was  taking  me  up  to  Luck- 
now — we  were  traveling  in  the  same  con- 
veyance— and  he  said  to  me  one  day,  "You 
should  be  very  thankful  that  you  will  have 
to  learn  only  one  language.  Our  Presby- 
terian brethren  over  on  the  other  side  of 
the  Ganges  have  a  wider  field,  where  three 
different  languages  are  spoken.  Think  of 
having  to  learn  three  languages — and  of 
such  a  big  field  as  there  is  in  all  Hindustan ! 
You  will  have  to  learn  nothing  else."  I 
was  very  thankful  when  I  heard  those 
things,  but  I  am  presiding  to-day  over  mis- 
sions in  which  we  are  preaching  the  Gospel 
in  thirty-five  different  languages  all  the 
time.     In  those  far-off  days  of  exceedingly 

28 


The:  Nisw  Missionary  Era. 

small  things  how  little  we  knew  what  God 
had  in  store  for  us ! 

We  have  given  every  one  of  these  people 
a  literature.  We  have  great  publishing 
houses — and  we  must  have  them — in  order 
to  provide  this  literature  for  the  thousands 
of  day  schools  that  we  have  established,  and 
also  for  the  higher  academies,  seminaries, 
colleges,  and  theological  schools. 

The;  First  Great  Reini^orcisment. 
I  am  not  as  young  as  I  was  when  I  went 
to  India  in  1859,  ^^^^  1  ^^  going  to  live 
until  I  see  the  first  installment  of  the  great 
reinforcement  come.  We  want  seventy-five 
new  men  at  once  in  Southern  Asia,  and  they 
need  just  as  many  in  Eastern  Asia — young 
men — and  they  should  have  fifty  in  Africa, 
and  they  should  have  fifty  in  Latin  Amer- 
ica, making  a  total  of  two  hundred  and 
fifty.  That  would  not  be  a  wonderful  re- 
inforcement.    It   would   be   only   the   first 


A  Cai,Iv  to  Advance. 

installment  that  must  be  sent  out  to  help 
us.  But  some  one  would  say,  "You  ought 
to  face  this  matter  as  a  practical  man.  You 
must  know  you  cannot  get  a  thousand  men, 
or  even  two  hundred  and  fifty."  It  depends 
a  great  deal  upon  how  we  approach  these 
young  men.  A  little  paragraph  in  the  news- 
papers is  not  going  to  create  much  excite- 
ment or  gain  much  attention ;  but  give  me 
the  cash,  and  give  me  health  and  time,  and 
in  twelve  months  I  will  find  the  two  hun- 
dred and  fifty  men,  or  else  I  will  confess  I 
don't  know  what  I  am  talking  about  in 
regard  to  missionary  matters. 

We  hear  all  over  the  land  that  very  few 
student  volunteers  have  found  their  way 
into  the  foreign  field,  and  it  seems  to  be 
intimated  that  these  volunteers  have  not 
been  sincere.  When  a  man  became  a  volun- 
teer in  the  time  of  the  recent  war  with 
Spain  his  name  was  put  down,  a  uniform 
was  put  on  him,  and  he  did  not  go  back 

30 


The:  Ne:w  Missionary  Era. 

home  again„  A  young  student  writes  down 
his  name  as  a  volunteer ;  he  goes  where  he 
pleases;  and  perhaps  we  call  upon  him 
some  time,  and  then  we  wonder  that  he 
has  lost  his  interest.  If  a  volunteer  in  Eng- 
land enters  the  English  army,  just  as  soon 
as  he  becomes  a  volunteer  and  is  sufficiently 
tested  physically  they  put  a  shilling  in  his 
hand,  and  the  man  who  takes  the  shilling 
belongs  to  the  king,  and  there  is  no  going 
back.  I  would  advise  our  friends  when 
calling  for  volunteers  to  change  the  terms, 
and  let  the  young  men  and  young  women 
understand  that  if  they  volunteer  it  means 
business. 

The  Bi:ginning  op  Large:  Giving. 
Then  again  some  one  says,  *'But  the 
money ;  you  will  never  get  the  money." 
My  friends,  I  think  there  is  money  enough. 
There  is  a  great  deal  of  money  in  the  world, 
and  I  think  the  majority  of  those  who  are 

31 


A  Cai,i,  to  Advance:. 

familiar  with  missionary  affairs  will  agree 
with  me  when  I  say  that  we  have  entered 
upon  a  missionary  revival,  and  I  believe  the 
missionary  revival  will  bring  a  great  and 
widespread  spiritual  revival,  and  it  will  em- 
brace all  great  and  good  interests.  We  may 
expect  several  results.  One  will  be  a  re- 
vival of  liberality.  Our  people  will  give. 
We  have  benevolent,  earnest  Christians,  as 
a  rule,  but  on  an  average  they  give  very 
little  to  this  great  enterprise.  One  year 
Ago  it  was  announced  that  one  of  our  mem- 
bers had  undertaken  to  give  one  hundred 
thousand  dollars  to  this  missionary  cause. 
It  made  a  profound  impression  in  the 
Church.  It  ought  to  have  done  so,  for  it 
was  the  largest  gift  ever  laid  upon  the  mis- 
sionary altar  of  Methodism  in  the  Old 
World  or  in  the  New.  That  gift  set  other 
people  to  thinking  as  to  whether  there  are 
any  others,  either  in  England  or  in  America, 
who  could  lay  down  one  hundred  thousand 

32 


The:  Ne:w  Missionary  Era. 

dollars  just  as  easily  as  one  thousand  dol- 
lars. We  have  not  looked  for  those  large 
gifts  ;  we  have  not  asked  for  them  ;  we  have 
not  prayed  for  them ;  we  have  not  appealed 
to  the  people  for  them  as  though  we  ex- 
pected we  would  get  them.  We  have  not 
moved  forward  to  get  the  people  to  do 
something  of  this  kind,  and  we  have  not  by 
our  position  suggested  to  the  people  at  large 
that  it  should  be  done.  We  have  suggested, 
however,  that  this  is  the  most  hallowed  of 
all  claims  of  Jesus  Christ  to-day,  and  it 
rests  upon  all  those  who  bear  his  name  on 
this  earth.  The  Church  is  going  to  get 
much  larger  gifts  than  the  one  mentioned, 
but  it  is  just  the  little  extra  help  that  comes 
here,  there,  and  yonder  that  in  the  long  run 
gives  us  the  money. 

Aggre:gate;  the  Litti^es. 
God's  plan  is  to  make  his  people  inclined 
to  give  the  money  that  will  carry  forward 
3  23 


A  Cai.1.  to  Advance. 

the  work.  What  would  they  give?  I  can 
perhaps  enHghten  you  on  that.  If  we  could 
get  our  membership,  inckiding  the  proba- 
tioners, to  give  two  pennies  a  week  it  would 
make  three  millions  of  dollars  a  year,  and 
with  that  three  million  dollars  a  year  for 
the  salvation  of  the  nations  what  would  not 
be  possible  ? 

But  you  say,  "We  can  never  collect  the 
pennies.  The  pennies  are  here,  but  we  can- 
not get  them.  How  are  Vv^e  ever  going  to 
get  the  money  together?" 

In  the  first  place,  you  will  never  get  the 
money  together  unless  you  apply  the  rule 
of  business  common  sense  to  the  work  you 
have  in  hand.  I  was  in  the  General  Con- 
ference in  1876  at  Baltimore,  and  when  the 
time  came  to  elect  missionary  secretaries  a 
great  many  of  the  men  seemed  to  be  almost 
in  despair  because  we  could  not  appoint  a 
man  who  had  sufficient  eloquence  to  fill  the 
post,  and  everybody  talked  about  Dr.  Dur- 

34 


The  Nl:w  Missionary  Era. 

bin.  It  was  said  we  would  never  have  an- 
other such  a  secretary  as  Dr.  Durbin.  I 
was  unknown  in  those  days,  and  I  sat 
quietly  in  my  seat,  but  I  said  to  myself, 
Those  men  don't  know  what  they  are  talk- 
ing about ;  for  they  have  the  idea  that  a 
missionary  treasury  is  to  be  supplied  by 
means  of  eloquence.  There  is  no  relation 
between  the  two  things.  An  eloquent  man 
may  have  an  audience,  and  he  may  force 
them  to  give,  but  what  has  he  done  for  the 
Church  ?  What  has  he  done  for  the  multi- 
tudes ?  How  far  has  his  influence  extended  ? 
Eloquence  is  very  cheap,  but  you  must  look 
a  great  deal  deeper  than  that.  That  appeals 
only  to  the  crust,  the  superficial  feeling  of 
the  human  heart.  Our  people  are  too  much 
afraid  of  the  cost.  The  whole  cost  of  col- 
lecting our  missionary  money  is  very,  very 
trifling,  but  we  may  pay  a  great  deal  too 
much  for  collecting.  We  have  economical 
ways  of  doing  things,  but  we  must  look  out 

35 


A  Cai.1.  to  Advance. 

what  we  are  doing.  We  may  make  the  So- 
ciety sustain  a  painful  loss,  a  loss  it  cannot 
bear,  in  order  that  we  may  appear  before 
the  world  as  doing  our  work  very  cheaply. 

Using  Mondy  to  Get  Money. 

Out  yonder  in  the  Southwest,  on  the 
plains  of  Arizona,  there  is  a  little  section 
of  the  desert  plain  on  which  there  may  be 
found  little  specks  of  gold,  tiny  little  par- 
ticles ;  and  yet  you  can  say  that  there  are 
three  millions  of  dollars  in  those  little 
specks,  mingled  with  sand,  and  any  person 
can  get  that  amount  of  gold  out  of  the  sand. 
You  go  to  New  York  and  go  to  some  cap- 
italist and  tell  him  about  it,  and  ask  him  if 
he  will  not  go  into  this  little  speculation  and 
advance  the  funds  to  separate  the  gold  from 
the  sand,  and  gather  it  out  and  bring  it  to 
New  York  or  to  Philadelphia.  He  asks  you 
what  the  cost  will  be,  and  you  say  to  him 
you  will  have  to  get  very  costly  machinery, 

36 


Thk  Nkw  Missionary  Era. 

and  it  will  cost  a  good  deal  to  get  the  gold 
out  from  the  desert  place.  You  must  take 
your  workmen  there,  and  a  good  deal  of 
expense  will  be  involved  in  this  enterprise. 
It  will  cost  him  fifty  thousand  dollars  to 
recover  three  million  dollars'  worth  of  gold. 
The  man  of  capital  does  not  hesitate ;  he 
says,  *'I  was  expecting  to  have  to  put 
down  one  hundred  thousand  dollars  to 
see  the  business  through."  A  hundred 
thousand  dollars  expended  in  order  to  gain 
three  million  dollars  is  nothing  at  all.  And 
just  as  your  golden  specks  are  among  the 
sands  of  the  desert,  so  the  pennies  are  in 
the  Methodist  homes  in  these  United  States, 
and  your  preachers  can  gather  them;  and 
you  have  thousands  of  preachers  in  the  land 
to  gather  them.  Your  class  leaders  will  not 
gather  them ;  you  cannot  move  them  with 
enough  energy  to  do  that  work.  You  must 
pay  for  this  work.  You  must  utilize  your 
men  and  your  women  and  your  children, 

Z7 


A  CaIvI.  to  Advance;. 

and  you  must  pay  for  it,  and  give  tlie  com- 
pensation here  and  there  to  the  young,  and 
if  it  costs  you  fifty  thousand  dollars  to  col- 
lect the  three  million  dollars  you  may  thank 
God  it  is  no  more.  Take  the  three  million 
dollars  because  it  is  three  million  dollars 
given  to  the  Lord,  and  once  started,  and 
you  get  your  three  million  dollars,  you  may 
be  doing  it  every  year,  and  with  it  v^e  will 
plant  a  hundred  thousand  schools  in  heathen 
lands,  and  in  less  than  twelve  months  we 
will  increase  your  converts  in  Southern  Asia 
at  the  rate  of  ten  thousand  a  month.  Out 
of  those  converts  we  have  we  must  let  all 
who  are  able  to  teach  do  so,  and  we  must 
let  them  read  the  word  of  God  if  they  are 
not  able  to  do  any  more  than  that. 

Two  Indian  Districts. 
I  must  tell  you  of  an  interesting  letter 
that  came  from  the  presiding  elder  of  the 
Gujarat  District,  Bombay  Conference.    He 

38 


Thi5  New  Missionary  Era.  - 

said  that  we  have  at  the  present  time  in 
this  field  something  hke  sixteen  or  seven- 
teen thousand  Christians.  Five  years  ago 
we  had  less  than  five  hundred.  We  have  at 
present  five  thousand  applicants  for  bap- 
tism. He  went  on  to  say  that  of  this  same 
class  of  people  we  have  a  hundred  thousand 
just  as  accessible  as  the  five  thousand,  and 
then  of  a  corresponding  class,  composed  of 
what  we  call  an  accessible  people,  we  have 
two  millions,  and  there  are  ten  millions  of 
all  classes.  Cross  the  mountains,  and  go 
on  until  you  come  to  the  district  called  the 
Punjab.  The  presiding  elder  from  there 
wrote  to  me  that  he  had  anywhere  from  ten 
thousand  to  fifteen  thousand  applicants  for 
baptism ;  and  everywhere  we  are  saying, 
We  cannot  do  more  ;  we  cannot  come. 

A  Christ-filIvEd  Enthusiasm. 

How  about  the  money  that  is  in  your  pos- 
session?    If  we  receive  it  we  will  inaugu- 

39 


A  CaIvIv  to  Advance. 

rate  the  greatest  movement  that  this  Chris- 
tian world  has  ever  seen.  People  sometimes 
intimate  to  me  that  I  am  an  enthusiast,  but 
if  I  am  it  is  not  in  every  direction,  and  it 
is  only  for  the  successful  work  of  the  king- 
dom and  for  the  establishment  of  the  reign 
of  Jesus  Christ  in  the  world.  I  have  the 
thought  in  my  inmost  soul  that  whatever 
measure  of  religious  enthusiasm  there  is  in 
this  poor  heart  of  mine  it  was  implanted 
there  by  Him  whose  name  I  bear  and  whom 
I  serve.  We  must  not  forget  that  most  se- 
rious and  important  fact,  that  the  Leader 
of  the  great  host  of  the  Lord  Almighty  is 
among  us  and  with  us  all  the  time.  I  can 
see  his  hand,  his  tender  love  coming  down 
upon  all  men ;  I  see  his  pierced  hands  and 
feet,  and  I  know  he  stands  beside  me  Vv^hile 
I  am  talking  to  you  at  this  hour.  I  know 
it  as  well  as  I  know  there  is  any  conscious- 
ness in  this  bosom  of  mine,  and  I  knov/  that 

I  am  giving  you  his  message,  a  message 

40 


Thd  N£;w  Missionary  Era. 

direct  from  him,  when  I  tell  you  that  in 
the  name  of  the  great  Methodist  host  in 
these  United  States  we  must  rise  up  and 
address  ourselves  to  this  great  task  with  a 
spirit  of  confidence  in  him,  and  we  must 
feel  as  we  have  never  felt  before. 

The:  Gleam  o^  Broad  Fieilds. 

There  was  a  time  when  I  was  very  much 
afraid  of  going  too  fast,  and  that  we  would 
extend  our  lines  too  far.  Away  back  in  the 
year  1872,  nearly  thirty-two  years  ago, 
when  timidly  I  had  commenced  crossing 
the  Ganges  and  was  preaching  on  the  west- 
ern shore,  I  went  down  to  Allahabad,  and  I 
saw  the  Presbyterian  synod  and  all  the 
brethren.  They  were  having  a  meeting 
while  I  was  there,  and  a  note  came  over 
from  a  European  living  at  Allahabad.  He 
was  bound  for  Lucknow.  He  had  heard  the 
preaching  and  had  been  converted,  and  his 
wife  was  greatly  troubled,  and  he  asked  me 

41 


A  CaivI.  to  Advance. 

if  I  would  not  come  over  and  talk  with  his 
wife.  So  I  asked  one  of  the  Presbyterian 
brethren  to  go  with  me,  and  we  went  over 
and  found  the  family,  and  they  asked  the 
neighboring  family  to  come  in,  and  there 
were  three  or  four  others.  I  talked  to  this 
woman  and  I  prayed  with  her,  and  Christ 
appeared  to  her,  and  we  came  away  thank- 
ful. But  the  next  day  came  and  another 
night,  and  the  next-door  neighbors  were  in 
trouble,  and  they  wished  me  to  com.e  again. 
I  took  two  friends  and  went  over  again,  and 
we  had  a  church  meeting  together,  and  God 
was  with  us,  so  we  tarried  there  with  the 
friends  until  it  was  midnight. 

Christian  Empires. 
I  went  to  Cawnpore,  where  I  was  to 
preach  at  six  o'clock  the  next  morning,  and 
when  I  lay  down  upon  the  hard  board  seat 
of  a  third-class  car  and  tried  to  sleep,  and 
thought  I  had  performed  my  whole  duty,  I 

42 


Thi'  Ne;w  Missionary  Era. 

found  I  could  not  sleep.  I  felt  that  some- 
thing was  going  to  happen  that  was  to  mark 
a  new  era  in  my  life.  God  had  laid  his 
hands  upon  me,  and  I  felt  we  must  go  in 
India  wherever  God  showed  us  a  beckoning 
hand.  I  lay  there  through  a  sleepless  night, 
and  in  the  morning  in  the  gray  dawn  I  saw 
the  eastern  sky.  It  was  all  aglow  with  the 
golden  light  of  the  coming  sun,  and  as  I 
looked  round  the  horizon  with  all  its  beauty 
I  felt,  The  Lord  endows  you  with  the  em- 
pire ;  only  may  you  be  permitted  to  tell  the 
story  of  the  risen  Son  of  God.  And  from 
that  day  God  has  given  me  a  commission  to 
go  wherever  he  wishes,  and  he  has  prom- 
ised to  be  present  wherever  he  shows  the 
pathway  of  duty.  I  didn't  know  what  it 
meant.  It  led  me  through  the  work  of  the 
year,  it  led  me  to  Calcutta,  it  led  me  to  Bur- 
ma, it  led  me  to  Singapore,  it  led  me  to  the 
Philippine  Islands,  it  led  me  around  the 
globe,  and  at  last,  thank  God,  I  am  here  to 

43 


A  Cai.1.  to  Advance;. 

tell  you  that  God  sends  you  this  message. 
You  are  to  build  Christian  empires ;  you  are 
to  go  out  and  subdue  kingdoms ;  and  to  take 
the  promise  of  God  in  its  plain  meaning. 
We  are  to  challenge  Satan,  and  wherever 
he  rears  his  banners  we  are  to  go  and  pro- 
claim God's  will  and  to  proclaim  the  power 
of  the  risen  Son  of  God. 

I  want  to  tell  you  how  I  was  first  called 
to  the  missionary  work.  It  was  through  a 
publication  of  the  Tract  Society.  I  was  only 
seventeen  years  old,  and  I  was  teaching  in 
a  little  school  in  southeastern  Ohio,  when 
there  came  along  an  agent  of  the  Tract  So- 
ciety, and  he  came  to  the  little  church.  I 
went  down  there  to  hear  him,  and  I  gave 
all  the  money  I  had  to  that  collection.  It 
was  a  good  deal  more  than  the  rest  of  the 
congregation  gave.  But  that  is  not  all.  I 
bought  a  couple  of  books.  One  contained 
sermons  and  addresses  by  Dr.  Allen,  one 
of  which  was  headed  "Our  Young  Men." 

44 


The;  Ne:w  Missionary  Era. 

As  I  read  down  a  page  Dr.  Allen  used  lan- 
guage like  this :  "The  time  is  at  hand  when 
our  young  men  will  be  called  upon  to  go 
forth  into  the  Eastern  world  and  to  lay  the 
foundations  for  Christian  empires."  And 
he  went  on  to  name  some  of  the  young  men 
who  had  gone  out  in  the  days  of  Judson. 
There  was  something  about  that  Christian 
empire  idea  that  set  fire  to  my  imagination, 
and  when  I  came  to  it  I  thanked  God  for 
it,  but  when  I  got  into  the  work  in  India  it 
never  occurred  to  me  that  I  was  laying  the 
foundations  of  Christian  empires.  But  there 
came  a  time — I  think  it  was  perhaps  that 
night  when  I  spent  those  sleepless  hours  in 
the  midst  of  most  wonderful  joy — when  the 
Lord  Jesus  was  teaching  me  and  showing 
me  a  vision.  There  came  that  night,  I  say, 
a  time  when  I  took  a  new  meaning  out  of 
those  words. 

That  is  the  work  we  are  doing  now.     We 
are  laying  tlie  foundations  of  Christian  em- 

45 


A  Cai.1.  to  Advance;. 

pires.  We  have  three  hundred  and  fifty 
million  people  v^^ith  which  to  fill  the  empires 
when  they  are  constructed,  and  there  is 
work  enough  to  do.  In  the  name  of  Him 
who  sent  me  forth  among  those  myriad 
throngs  I  call  upon  you,  as  representatives 
of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church,  to  rouse 
yourselves,  take  up  your  duty,  give  us  the 
money,  give  us  the  men,  and  bid  us  go  forth 
to  victory. 

46 


III. 

GO    OR    SEND! 

By  REV,   WILLIAM  F.   McDOWELL,   D.D. 

These:  are  imperial  words.  They  contain 
imperial  ideas.  They  suggest  an  imperial 
enterprise.  They  are  the  words  of  an  im- 
perial Person.  They  will  represent  an 
imperial  truth  at  last.  For  a  deed  must  first 
be  a  dream.  It  must  be  first  faith,  then  fact. 
When  a  dream  or  a  faith  or  a  truth  becomes 
incarnate  in  a  Christ  then  it  will  become  a 
fact  in  history. 

David  Livingstone  used  to  end  his  letters, 
his  newspaper  articles,  his  lectures  and  ad- 
dresses with  the  words,  "The  end  of  the 
exploration  is  the  beginning  of  the  enter- 
prise." So,  at  the  close  of  these  days 
together  we  may  say,  *'The  end  of  the 
Convention   is   the   beginning  of  the   con- 


A  Cai,!,  to  Advance. 

quest ;  the  end  of  the  vision  is  the  beginning 
of  the  task,  the  end  of  the  praying  is  the 
beginning  of  the  consecration,  the  end  of 
what  we  have  done  here  is  the  beginning  of 
what  we  shall  do  in  all  the  round  world." 

The  W0R1.D  Without  Christ. 

I  shall  ask  you  two  or  three  questions 
which  lie  at  the  bottom  of  the  mighty  theme 
in  the  words  '*Go  or  send."  I  like  to  say 
go  and  send,  and  to  say  both  words  in  the 
colleges  and  out  of  them.  First,  then,  have 
you  a  keen,  vital,  moving  sense  of  the  con- 
dition of  the  world  without  Christ?  It  is 
not  twenty-four  hours  since  a  member  of 
our  Church  sitting  within  this  hall  said  pet- 
ulantly, "They  are  making  a  great  ado  about 
the  heathen ;  it  seems  to  me  that  the  heathen 
are  getting  along  fairly  well."  Do  you  think 
that?  Do  you  think  that  anyone  is  getting 
along  even  fairly  well  without  Christ?  If 
he  stood  here  and  asked  you  what  you  think 

48 


Go  OR  Send! 

of  ■  the  world  without  him,  what  answer 
would  you  give?  But  he  does  stand  here 
asking  just  that  question.  Is  he  a  conve- 
nience to  the  world  or  a  necessity  to  it?  Is 
there  any  other  name,  or  is  his  the  only 
name  under  heaven  ?  This  is  the  most  dan- 
gerous of  all  modern  skepticisms,  that  the 
world  can  be  saved  without  Christ. 

This  sense  of  the  world's  condition  apart 
from  Christ  is  not  begotten  in  men's  hearts 
except  by  prayer  for  the  world  which  knows 
him  not.  You  do  not  care  much  for  them? 
You  do  care  much  for  him?  Then  go 
home  to-night  and  kneel  down  alone  with 
Christ  in  prayer  to  him  for  the  world's  mil- 
lions; let  them  tramp  in  endless  procession 
through  your  room  while  you  pray  until  the 
morning  comes,  and  you  will  never  have  an- 
other contented  hour  until  the  world  is  in 
Christ.  For  in  the  thought  of  Christ  there 
is  neither  foreign  land  nor  foreign  man.  All 
are  one  in  him. 

4  49 


A  Cai.Iv  to  Advance:. 

The;  Cross  the;  Ce:nte:r  o^  Christianity. 

I  have  studied  the  religions  of  the  v^orld 
a  little  and  talked  v\^ith  many  men  vv^ho  have 
been  much  abroad.  My  conclusion  is  that 
men  are  not  perishing  anywhere  for  lack, 
simply,  of  a  new  theological  system,  nor  for 
a  new  code  of  ethics.  The  heathen  nations 
have  more  theology  than  they  can  under- 
stand and  better  ethical  codes  than  they 
can  live  up  to.  I  would  hardly  go  or  send 
across  the  street  simply  to  send  these  to 
the  nations.  But  the  cross  is  the  center 
of  the  Christian  religion,  and  Christianity 
is  the  only  religion  which  has  a  cross 
in  it.  I  would  go  around  the  world,  and 
would  tell  my  friends  the  students  to  go, 
and  tell  you  to  send,  to  tell  men  every- 
where that 

•'  There  is  a  fountain  filled  with  blood 
Drawn  from  Immanuel's  veins; 

And  sinners,  plunged  beneath  that  flood, 
Lose  all  their  guilty  stains." 

50 


Go  OR  Sknd! 

What  do  you  say  to  that?  Will  you  do 
that  ?  Have  you  a  keen,  vital,  moving  sense 
of  the  world  without  Christ?  I  read  the 
other  day  in  the  Report  of  the  Ecumenical 
Conference  held  in  New  York  in  1900  what 
former  President  Benjamin  Harrison  said 
of  Theodore  Roosevelt,  then  Governor  of 
New  York,  now  President  of  the  United 
States :  ''Mr  Roosevelt  was  an  office  holder 
under  my  administration,  and  I  had  only 
one  trouble  managing  him.  He  wanted  to 
clear  up  all  the  business  under  the  sun  be- 
tween sunrise  and  sunset."  And  we  are  at 
such  leisure  in  this  business  and  God  seems 
to  be  in  such  haste  to  have  it  done. 

Our  Share:  in  World  Citizenship. 

I  ask  another  question :  Have  you  a  keen, 
vital,  moving  sense  of  your  personal  share 
in  making  these  imperial  ideas  imperial 
truths  ? 

It  is  not  a  very  comfortable  time  to  be 
51 


A  CalIv  to  Advance. 

alive;  but  it  is  worth  while  to  live  just  now. 
It  belongs  to  us  to  be  citizens  of  the  world. 
Wendell  Phillips  once  said,  "I  love  inex- 
pressibly these  streets  of  Boston  over  which 
my  mother  led  my  baby  feet,  and  if  God 
will  give  me  time  enough  I  will  make  these 
streets  too  pure  for  the  footsteps  of  a  slave." 
And  it  came  to  pass  at  last,  though  at  great 
cost.  Now  the  cities  of  the  world  are  before 
our  eyes  and  the  citizens  of  the  world  are 
our  neighbors.  Shall  we  make  the  streets 
of  all  cities  in  all  lands  pure  enough  for  the 
footsteps  of  the  King?  Dean  Stanley  said 
he  asked  an  old  man  in  the  cemetery  of  City 
Road  Chapel  in  London  by  whom  the  cem- 
etery had  been  consecrated.  The  old  man 
replied,  "It  is  consecrated,  sir,  by  the  bones 
of  that  good  man  John  Wesley.'*  But  Mr. 
Wesley  did  vastly  more  than  that  in  his 
long  and  useful  life.  He  did  far  more  than 
consecrate  a  place  where  dead  men  might  be 
buried ;  he  consecrated  streets  where  living 

52 


Go  OR  Se;nd! 

men  lived.  It  is  ours  to  leave  our  ease  and 
comfort  while  we  make  the  streets  of  all 
cities  in  all  lands  safe  and  clean  for  the  foot- 
steps of  pure  women  and  innocent  children. 

It  May  Mean  Your  Boy  or  Giru 

Do  you  feel  that  way  about  it?  If  you  do 
it  means  that  there  must  be  a  vast  increase 
in  the  consecration  of  persons  and  property 
to  this  task.  If  you  really  mean  to  do  it  it 
will  take  more  people.  You  will  have  to 
furnish  them.  It  will  take  more  money. 
You  will  have  to  supply  that.  The  latter 
is  rather  easier  than  the  former.  It  has 
come  to  be  taken  for  granted  that  homes  of 
a  certain  kind  are  not  expected  to  furnish 
missionaries  or  preachers  any  more.  When 
a  few  rich  young  men  enlisted  for  the  Span- 
ish War  the  papers  made  a  great  fuss  about 
it.  But  why?  Is  liberty  or  the  republic 
less  dear  and  precious  to  them  than  to  the 
poor  ?    So  it  awakens  comment  when  out  of 

53 


A  Cai.1,  to  Advance:. 

a  wealthy  home  one  goes  as  a  missionary. 
But  why  ?  Was  not  He  rich  and  did  not  He 
become  poor  for  our  sakes  ?  Could  He  have 
saved  himself  without  saving  us?  I  do  not 
ask  whether  we  can  save  the  world  without 
these  choice  youths  from  choice  families. 
The  question  is  whether  they  can  be  saved 
without  this  offering  of  their  lives  to  Christ. 
You  can  hire  a  substitute  ?  You  can  pay  the 
salary  of  a  poor  bo}^  or  girl  who  goes  to  the 
mission  field  ?  And  you  will  ?  That  is  well. 
But  that  is  no  reason  why  your  boy  or  girl 
should  not  enter  this  royal  service  for  Jesus. 
Our  ministry  in  his  name  is  to  all  classes. 
It  must  come  from  all  classes,  so  that  in  him 
there  shall  be  no  classes.  Are  you  ready 
for  that?  One  day  during  the  civil  war  a 
Massachusetts  regiment,  not  the  first  nor 
the  second,  marched  down  Broadway.  A 
well-dressed  New  Yorker  stepped  up  and 
asked  an  officer,  **How  long  can  Massachu- 
setts keep  this  up?"    And  the  proud  man, 

54 


Go  OR  Send! 

knowing  his  dear  State,  replied,  "Just  as 
long  as  necessary,  and  if  necessary  Massa- 
chusetts herself  will  go  to  the  front."  Can 
we  keep  up  this  sending  of  our  fairest  and 
best  to  the  front  as  long  as  it  is  necessary? 
Can  we,  even  if  it  costs  our  own?  And  if 
necessary,  rather  than  see  his  kingdom 
fail,  will  the  Church  herself  go  to  the 
front  ?  Will  it  ?  Do  we  really  feel  that  way 
about  it? 

One  day  during  the  same  civil  war  Father 
Taylor  of  Boston  inherited  a  small  sum  of 
money  and  wanted  to  invest  it  in  govern- 
ment bonds,  then  on  the  market.  A  prudent 
friend  cautioned  him  to  be  careful,  saying 
that  if  the  government  failed  the  bonds 
would  be  worthless.  "Put  it  all  in,  put  it  all 
in,"  the  old  man  shouted.  "If  the  govern- 
ment fails  I  do  not  want  to  be  worth  any- 
thing!" Do  you  feel  that  way  about  the 
kingdom  ?  If  the  Kingdom  of  all  kingdoms 
fails,  will  any  amount  make  anybody  worth 

55 


A  Cai,!,  to  Advance;. 

anything?  And  if  it  succeeds  shall  not  the 
children  of  the  King  have  enough  to  make 
them  rich  ? 

The  New  Vision  o^  Christ. 

I  ask  again,  Have  you  a  keen,  vital,  mov- 
ing sense  of  the  living  Christ,  his  plans  and 
power?  He  is  not  dead,  but  alive.  He 
means  to  have  this  business  done.  Do  you  ? 
He  means  to  girdle  the  earth  with  the  mel- 
ody of  the  angels'  song.  Do  you  ?  I  think 
the  best  thing  that  has  come  to  our  age  is 
the  new  vision  of  Christ.  And  this  new 
vision  has  come. 

The  students  of  this  day  see  Christ  more 
clearly  than  did  the  students  of  my  day,  a 
quarter  of  a  century  ago.  This  is  the  pro- 
foundest  fact  in  the  student  world  of  to-day. 
It  was  said  a  few  years  ago  that  there  is  no 
chance  any  more  for  a  great  career;  that 
young  men  need  not  look  for  such  openings 
as  came  to  the  generation  before  ours.  Then 

56 


Go  OR  Se:nd! 

suddenly  there  fell  upon  the  students  of  the 
republic    cloven    tongues    like    as    of    fire. 
I     saw    them    on    the     shores    of    Lake 
Geneva  and  in  scores  of  colleges.     Then 
old  men  began  to  dream  dreams,  not  of  the 
past,  but  of  the  future.     Young  men  and 
women  began  to  see  visions  of  a  world  out 
of  Christ,  and  of  a  Christ  with  a  world  on 
his  heart.     They  began  to  talk  about  the 
evangelization  of  the  world  in  this  genera- 
tion and  to  offer  their  lives  for  it.     It  was 
good  for  the  Church  to  have  that  happen. 
It  was  not  good  when  year  after  year  the 
Missionary  Society  had  to  say  to  the  volun- 
teers that  retrenchment  and   not  advance 
was  the  order  of  the  Church.     It  will  be 
good  if  we  never  have  to  say  that  again  to 
our  Methodist  young  people. 

It  has  been  worth  while  to  speak  to  youth 
in  the  last  ten  years.  It  will  be  worth  more 
in  the  next  ten.  At  Cleveland  and  now  at 
Philadelphia  you  have  been  thinking  of  the 

57 


A  Cai.1,  to  Advance;. 

unsaved  millions.  I,  too,  have  been  thinking 
of  them ;  but  I  have  been  thinking  also,  be- 
cause that  is  my  business,  what  I  shall  say 
to  youth,  to  the  students  in  the  Church. 
Shall  I  tell  them,  with  your  authority,  that 
the  Church  of  God  makes  a  supreme  appeal 
to  the  best  young  manhood  and  womanhood 
of  the  Church  to  do  the  supreme  thing  for 
Jesus  Christ  in  our  own  time?  Shall  I  tell 
them,  with  your  authority,  that  you  will 
match  your  lives  against  theirs?  Shall  I 
tell  them  that  you  have  seen  the  Master  of 
us  all  and  have  entered  into  his  plans  ?  You 
remember  that  Sir  Philip  Sidney  when  a 
mere  lad  wrote  to  his  brother,  "li  there  are 
any  good  wars,  I  shall  attend  them."  O, 
there  will  be  some  beautiful  wars  long  be- 
fore we  are  dead.  They  will  be  the  wars 
that  bring  peace  to  the  nations.  The  Prince 
of  Peace  leads  the  hosts.  He  means  to  win. 
Shall  we  enter  into  his  plans,  looking  unto 
him? 

58 


Go  OR  Send! 

Christ's  Rightful  Lordship. 

I  ask  one  more  question :  Have  you  a 
keen,  vital,  moving  sense  of  the  lordship  of 
the  living  Christ,  and  his  right  to  reign? 

Who  is  this  that  assumes  sovereign  right 
over  persons  and  property?  Who  is  this 
that  says  go  and  send  in  this  imperial 
fashion?  The  State?  Then  we  may  ques- 
tion it.  Only  in  rare  emergencies  has  the 
State  such  power  over  persons  and  property. 
We  live  where  we  choose  and  the  State  has 
only  limited  control  over  us.  The  Church? 
But  the  Church  is  not  so  supreme  that  it  can 
take  absolute  direction  of  life  and  means.  I 
will  debate  with  them  in  the  face  of  such 
lofty  orders.  They  must  convince  me  and 
persuade  me.    Then  I  will  go. 

But  the  Christ?  I  cannot  debate  with 
him,  nor  question  him,  nor  reason  why.  In 
face  of  his  command,  it  is  ours  only  to  do  or 
die.    He  never  blundered.    One  is  our  Mas- 

59 


A  Cai^l  to  Advance. 

ter,  even  Christ.  He  is  Lord  by  the  authority 
of  the  Spirit.  When  he  asks  for  Hfe,  Hfe  he 
must  have.  When  he  asks  for  gold,  who  are 
we  to  withhold  gold  from  him? 

' '  O  Lord  and  Master  of  us  all, 
Whate'er  our  name  or  sign, 

We  own  thy  sway,  we  hear  thy  call, 
We  test  our  lives  by  thine  !" 

Obedience  to  Christ  is  the  test.  Conformity 
to  Christ  is  the  pattern.  God  gave  us  in 
Christ  the  example  of  one  who  came ;  in 
himself,  the  example  of  one  who  sent. 

"If  Jesus  Christ  is  a  man — 

And  only  a  man — I  say 
That  of  all  mankind  I  cleave  to  him, 

And  to  him  will  I  cleave  alway. 

*'  If  Jesus  Christ  is  a  God — 

And  the  only  God — I  swear 
I  will  follow  him  through  heaven  and  hell, 

The  earth,  the  sea,  and  the  air ! " 

He  is  the  sovereign  Lord.     We  cannot 

debate  with  him   whether  he   says  go,   or 

send,  or  both. 

60 


Go  OR  Se:nd! 

Here,  then,  we  stand  at  the  close  of  this 
Convention,  to  be  judged  at  last  by  what 
we  have  heard  and  said  and  what  we  have 
done  with  it.    We  are  not  without  the  Spirit 
of  Christ,  and  we  are  not  out  of  his  presence. 
We  can  close  our  eyes  and  see  no  one  but 
Jesus  only.    But  looking  farther  we  can  see 
stretching  out  behind  and  beyond  the  count- 
less millions  of  whom  we  have  heard.     In 
vision  we  can  see  them  together.     Shall  we 
bring  them  together?     Here  in  his  living 
presence  shall  we  clasp  hands  in  solemn  cov- 
enant that  when  he  tells  us  to  go  we  will 
go,  and  when  he  tells  us  to  send,  we  will 
send?    That  whatsoever  he  says  to  us  now 
and  always,  that  we  will  do?     Shall  we  in 
Christ's  name  and  presence  make  a  solemn 
covenant  that  we  will  obey  him  in  this  Con- 
vention and  in  cities  and  towns  when  we 
have  gone  out  from  here?     That  we  will 
obey  him  in  our  silver  and  gold,  and  obey 
him  with  our  sons  and  daughters?     That 

6i 


A  Cai,Iv  to  Advance. 

we  will  obey  him  with  any  sacrifice  and  at 

any  cost,  remembering  his  own  cross  ?    That 

we  will  obey  him  in  poverty  and  wealth,  at 

home  and  abroad,  on  land  and  sea  until  once 

more  the  world  shall  cry  that  he  has  come? 

That  we  shall  obey  him  until  we  stand  with 

the  great  host  from  every  land  and  cast  our 

crowns  before  him  ?    Shall  we  ?    This  is  the 

imperial  word  of  the  imperial  Christ,  ''Go 

or  send."    "Whatsoever  he  saith  unto  you, 

do  it." 

62 


IV. 

THE    RIGHT    OF  JESUS   TO 
REIGN. 

By  BISHOP  WARREN  A.   CANDLER,   D.D. 

The:  world  has  heard  much  of  a  divine 
right  by  which  some  who  are  called  kings 
claim  to  reign.  The  phrase  is  not  very 
agreeable  to  our  republican  ears  (or,  if 
you  don't  like  that  adjective,  to  our  demo- 
cratic ears),  because  it  seems  to  imply  that 
one  man  may  exercise  authority  over  other 
men,  and  that  too  under  divine  sanction,  in 
such  a  way  as  is  wholly  inconsistent  with 
our  conceptions  of  human  freedom  and  re- 
pugnant to  our  notions  of  divine  justice. 
And  yet,  as  nearly  every  fiction  has  some 
truth  back   of  it,   this  phrase  points   to  a 

63 


A  Cai,!,  to  Advance. 

great  truth.  It  points  backward  to  govern- 
ments of  the  past  which  did  rest  upon  divine 
right.  The  first  governments  of  the  world 
were  both  in  form  and  in  nature  necessa- 
rily patriarchal.  They  rested  upon  human 
parenthood,  and  because  parenthood  is  the 
gift  of  God  and  children  do  not  elect  their 
fathers,  those  governments  rested  on  divine 
right.  As  the  family  grew  into  the  tribe, 
and  the  tribe  into  the  gens,  the  head  of  the 
house  continued  to  rule  over  the  domestic 
commonwealth  and  the  political  system  con- 
tinued patriarchal.  As  descendants  multi- 
plied the  commonwealth  extended,  and  the 
relation  of  its  patriarchal  head  with  his 
subjects  was  less  intimate ;  yet  perhaps 
there  was  no  diminution  of  his  authority, 
but  rather  an  increase  in  the  reverence  ac- 
corded to  him.  In  process  of  time,  when 
parts  of  the  tribe  wandered  away  from  the 
original  home  and  occupied  a  new  location, 
one  of  the  kinsmen  presided  over  the  mi- 

64 


The:  Right  of  Jksus  to  Re;ign. 

gratory  company ;  but  he  ruled  by  virtue 
of  his  seniority  and  kinship.  His  authority 
was  not  that  of  a  tyrant  ruling  by  force, 
but  that  of  one  who  wields  a  scepter  of 
love  and  is  obeyed  by  his  people  with  the 
loyalty  of  affection.  He  found  his  highest 
good  in  blessing  those  related  to  him  as 
subject  children,  and  his  highest  honor  in 
advancing  the  glory  of  his  devoted 
followers. 

Like  these  early  governments  of  the 
world,  the  right  of  Christ  to  reign  rests  on 
his  patriarchal  authority.  His  kingdom  is 
founded  upon  his  power  to  create  patri- 
archy by  the  processes  of  regeneration  and 
renewal  in  the  kingdom  of  God.  His  gov- 
ernment is  a  kingdom  in  which  the  sub- 
jects are  born  from  the  King,  and  yield  to 
him  the  submission  of  love.  I  have  in  my 
library  a  book  called  The  Republic  of  God; 
I  cannot  conceive  of  a  title  more  absolutely 
misleading.     There  is  no  republic  of  God, 

s  65 


A  Cai.1.  to  Advance. 

and  never  was.  The  subjects  of  this  divine 
government  have  no  rights  of  legislation. 
Its  laws  are  decrees  of  the  patriarchal  King. 
This  form  of  government  has  been  the 
type  of  the  divine  order  from  the  very- 
beginning. 

The  government  of  God  in  Eden  was 
of  this  patriarchal  sort.  That  government 
was  designed  to  reach  its  perfection  in  hu- 
man sonship  subject  to  divine  fatherhood. 
God's  object  in  the  creation  of  man  was  son- 
ship.  This  is  the  chief  end  of  man.  The 
answer  commonly  given  in  the  Catechisms 
to  the  question,  "What  is  the  chief  end  of 
man?"  is  misleading  to  the  average  reader. 
That  answer  is,  "To  glorify  God  and  en- 
joy him  forever" — a  very  correct  answer  if 
rightly  understood,  but  a  very  false  an- 
swer as  commonly  interpreted.  The  idea 
conveyed  by  it  to  most  men  is  that  God 
is  a  great  Monarch,  high  and  lifted  up  upon 
a  throne  of  supreme  majesty,  and  particu- 

66 


The;  Right  of  Jesus  to  Reign. 

larly  well  pleased  when  men  burn  incense 
before  him.  This  is  to  deify  vanity  and  to 
enthrone  ambition  in  the  heavens.  Our 
God  is  not  simply  a  great  King  but  a 
heavenly  Father.  When  he  made  man,  in 
the  outset,  it  was  not  the  act  of  a  supreme 
Sovereign  surfeited  with  the  ancient  praises 
of  angelic  hosts,  creating  a  new  being 
who  should  bring  to  him  a  novel  form  of 
applause.  It  was  rather  a  great  Father 
with  paternal  purpose,  seeking  children  in 
his  own  image  and  likeness.  And  when 
Jesus  Christ  came  in  the  flesh  and  walked 
in  our  world  he  was  not  a  prince,  traveling 
in  the  greatness  of  his  strength  in  order  to 
recover  the  alienated  revenue  of  a  rebellious 
province,  but  he  was  a  loving  Father  pass- 
ing through  the  haunts  of  his  wayward 
children,  trying  to  get  them  back  home. 
The  culmination  of  creation  and  redemption 
is  the  production  of  sons  as  the  subjects  of 
the  divine  kingdom. 

67 


A  Cai.Iv  to  Advance. 

A  Government  oi^  Sons. 

As  the  purpose  of  God  was  to  create  a 
government  of  sons,  the  effort  of  Satan  has 
always  been  directed  to  the  defeat  of  this 
purpose.  In  the  garden,  at  the  very  outset 
of  history,  he  undertook  to  defeat  this  high 
end.  He  comes  to  the  first  pair,  tempting 
them  through  the  very  instinct  and  aspira- 
tion of  childhood.  He  could  not  approach 
them  otherwise,  and  so  he  says,  *'If  you 
would  be  like  God,  do  not  follow  the  te- 
dious processes  of  life  ordered  by  the  Al- 
mighty, but  eat  of  this  forbidden  fruit,  and 
by  this  short  cut  arrive  at  the  thing  you  de- 
sire." In  the  temptation  of  the  Saviour  in 
the  wilderness  the  entire  assault  of  the  devil 
is  delivered  upon  the  Sonship  of  the  Mes- 
siah. He  begins  every  temptation  with  the 
words,  "If  thou  be  the  Son  of  God"  do  this 
or  that.  Distrust  your  Father's  care  and 
feed  yourself  with  bread  made  from  stones ; 

68 


The;  Right  or^  Je:sus  to  Reign. 

presume  upon  your  Father's  care  and  cast 
yourself  down  from  the  pinnacle  of  the 
temple  through  the  purple  twilight,  upborne 
by  angelic  wings;  or  come  to  your  inherit- 
ance as  a  Son  and  to  your  dominion  as  the 
first  Prince  of  the  skies  by  falling  down  and 
worshiping  me,  stooping  to  conquer  that  you 
may  come  to  your  highest  state.  Before  the 
assault  of  Satan  the  first  Adam  went  down, 
forfeiting  his  sonship ;  but  the  second  Adam, 
who  is  the  Lord  from  heaven,  triumphantly' 
overcame  and  maintained  his  Sonship,  that 
he  might  become  the  first-born  of  many 
brethren  in  bringing  many  sons  unto  glory. 
In  maintaining  his  own  Sonship  and  by 
his  resurrection,  reaching  the  full  height  of 
its  authority  and  securing  the  quickening 
powers  of  eternal  life,  Jesus  obtained  the 
right  to  reign  as  a  patriarchal  king.  His 
right  rests  therefore  on  his  ability  to  create 
an  unearthly  type  of  life  and  to  make  a 
Christian  commonwealth  of  children  sprung 

69 


A  Cai.1,  to  Advance). 

from  his  life-giving  power.  The  angel  of 
the  annunciation  in  announcing  to  the  Vir- 
gin mother  the  birth  of  the  coming  Son 
brings  to  her  devout  recollection  the  prom- 
ise made  to  David,  that  of  the  fruit  of  his 
loins  God  would  raise  up  one  to  sit  upon  his 
throne.  When  the  forerunner  of  the  Mes- 
siah began  preaching  in  the  wilderness  he 
proclaimed  an  approaching  King,  saying, 
''Repent,  for  the  kingdom  of  heaven  is  at 
hand."  Nor  would  he  allow  the  people  to 
suppose  that  the  coming  kingdom  would  be 
erected  upon  any  basis  of  natural  birth. 
Wherefore  he  said,  "Say  not  ye.  We  have 
Abraham  to  our  father :  for  I  say  unto  you, 
that  God  is  able  of  these  stones  to  raise  up 
children  unto  Abraham.."  When  imme- 
diately following  his  ministry  the  Master 
came,  he  did  not  disavow  the  proclamation 
of  his  forerunner  nor  repudiate  the  program 
of  the  kingdom  as  set  out  by  him.  The  rec- 
ord isj  "He  went  throughout  their  cities  and 

70 


The:  Right  o^  Jksus  to  Reign. 

villages  preaching  the  Gospel  of  the  king- 
dom." When  one  of  their  rulers  came  for  a 
personal  interview  concerning  the  new  king- 
dom the  Lord  causes  him  to  understand  that 
it  is  a  patriarchy  founded  in  heavenly  birth, 
declaring  to  Nicodemus,  ''Except  a  man  be 
born  from  above  he  cannot  see  the  kingdom 
of  God."  In  all  the  course  of  his  ministry 
he  never  ceases  to  claim  his  royalty,  nor 
does  he  ever  disguise  his  purpose  to  erect  a 
patriarchal  throne.  In  the  hour  of  his  ex- 
tremity when  he  stands  before  Pilate,  and  is 
demanded  to  say  whether  he  claims  royal 
prerogatives  or  not,  he  frankly  affirms, 
"To  this  end  was  I  born."  When  he  de- 
clares, *'My  kingdom  is  not  of  this  world," 
it  is  not  an  ingenious  phrase  used  to  avoid 
a  disagreeable  colHsion  with  a  political 
power,  nor  is  it  the  renunciation  of  a  real 
royalty  to  be  substituted  by  a  phantom  king- 
ship. On  the  contrary,  by  the  very  words 
used  he  laid  claim  to  a  more  real  kingdom 

71 


A  Cai.i,  to  Advance. 

and  a  more  pervasive  authority  than  any 
merely  visible  political  structure.  If  Pilate 
had  truly  understood  the  significance  of 
those  words  he  would  have  perceived  that 
Jesus  was  not  receding  from  any  pretensions 
he  had  made,  but  was  rather  asserting  a 
higher  and  more  inflexible  authority  than 
that  implied  by  the  accusation  which  the 
Jews  brought  against  him.  Jesus  went  to 
his  crucifixion  because  he  asserted  his  royal 
authority  and  kingly  rights ;  and  we  dare 
not  imagine  that  he  immolated  himself  for  a 
mere  rhetorical  figure.  He  meant  to  be  a 
real  King;  not  one  whose  twopenny  crown 
is  held  upon  his  head  by  a  fastening  of 
force,  but  one  who  truly  rules  as  well  as 
reigns.  Our  little  earthly  monarchs  cannot 
keep  their  crowns  on  their  heads,  nor  can 
they  always  hold  even  their  heads  on.  Such 
was  not  the  royalty  of  our  Lord.  He  in- 
tended to  be  a  patriarchal  ruler  whose  au- 
thority should  be  absolute  in  this  world  and 

72 


The:  Right  of  Jesus  to  Re:ign. 

in  all  worlds.  And  so  from  the  outset  to  the 
end  of  his  public  ministry  he  is  ever  moving 
forward  with  this  end  in  view. 

Christ's  Ci.aim  to  Rkgal  Powe:r. 

But  while  ever  prosecuting  this  purpose, 
not  until  after  his  resurrection  does  he  make 
distinct  claim  to  his  regal  power.  Therefore 
he  walked  in  destitution,  poorer  than  the 
foxes  of  the  forest  and  the  birds  of  the  air, 
often  sleeping  under  the  silent  stars,  and 
finding  his  locks  wet  with  the  dews  of  the 
night.  But  after  his  resurrection  his  tone  is 
entirely  changed.  He  talks  of  nothing  else 
but  his  kingdom.  It  is  the  one  absorbing 
subject  of  his  utterances  during  all  the  forty 
days  of  his  sojourn  in  the  earth  between  the 
resurrection  and  the  ascension.  His  whole 
discourse  to  the  apostles  and  to  all  his  fol- 
lowers during  that  period  was  touching  this 
high  matter.  He  opens  to  them  the  Scrip- 
tures, showing  them  the  things  which  Moses 

73 


A  Cai,Iv  to  Advance:. 

and  the  psalms  and  the  prophets  said  con- 
cerning himself,  declaring,  "Thus  it  is  writ- 
ten, and  thus  it  behooved  Christ  to  suffer, 
and  to  rise  again  from  the  dead  the  third 
day,  that  repentance  and  remission  of  sins 
should  be  preached  in  his  name  to  all  na- 
tions." He  makes  the  tremendous  claim, 
"All  power  is  given  unto  me  in  heaven  and 
in  earth."  And  then  with  a  far-reaching 
"therefore,"  which  rests  on  that  great  claim, 
he  says,  "Go  ye  therefore  into  all  the  world, 
and  preach  the  Gospel  to  every  creature, 
baptizing  them  in  the  name  of  the  Father, 
and  of  the  Son,  and  of  the  Holy  Ghost; 
teaching  them  to  observe  all  things  whatso- 
ever I  have  commanded  you :  and,  lo,  I  am 
with  you  alway,  even  unto  the  end  of  the 
world."  Previous  to  his  resurrection  we 
find  no  such  immense  claim  and  no  such  far- 
reaching  commandment. 

Following  his  divine  commandment  after 
his  ascension,  the  apostles  rest  his  claims 

74 


The:  Right  oi^  Jeisus  to  Reign. 

upon  the  same  foundation,  and  propagate 
his  Gospel  with  a  view  to  his  enthronement 
as  the  King  of  all  souls.  They  preach  ''Jesus 
and  the  resurrection."  When  on  the  day  of 
Pentecost  St.  Peter  preached  the  opening 
sermon  of  the  new  kingdom  he  founded  his 
argument  upon  a  Messianic  prophecy  of 
King  David  touching  the  royalty  and  the 
resurrection  of  his  ascended  Lord.  And,  by 
the  way,  St.  Peter  really  believed  in  the 
Messianic  psalms  and  the  inspiration  of  the 
Old  Testament  Scriptures.  So  also  did  St. 
Paul  and  the  rest  of  the  apostles.  They  may 
have  been  wanting  in  critical  ability,  and 
perhaps  did  not  know  what  they  were  talk- 
ing about,  but  it  is  absolutely  certain  that 
they  viewed  the  Old  Testament  from  a 
standpoint  entirely  different  from  that  of  the 
gentlemen  who  are  commonly  called  in  our 
day  "higher  critics."  For  my  own  part, 
frankly  acknowledging  my  shortcomings  in 
scholarship,  and  having  to  make  up  a  work- 

75 


A  Cai,!.  to  Advance. 

ing  theory  on  this  subject,  I  have  deliber- 
ately determined  to  risk  agreeing  with  the 
views  of  Peter  and  Paul,  rather  than  take 
the  chances  involved  in  accepting  the  theo- 
ries of  our  modern  critics.  Peter  and  Paul 
and  the  rest  of  the  apostles  have  at  least  the 
advantage  over  the  critics  that  they  agree 
with  each  other,  and  held  to  the  same  theory 
touching  the  Hebrew  Scriptures  throughout 
the  entire  length  of  their  lives. 

The;  Te:aching  of  the:  Apostlks. 

But  as  I  was  saying,  in  his  sermon  at  Pen- 
tecost St.  Peter  alludes  to  a  psalm  of  David, 
and  says,  "Therefore  being  a  prophet,  and 
knowing  that  God  had  sworn  with  an  oath 
to  him,  that  of  the  fruit  of  his  loins,  accord- 
ing to  the  flesh,  he  would  raise  up  Christ  to 
sit  on  his  throne;  he,  seeing  this  before, 
spake  of  the  resurrection  of  Christ,  that  his 
soul  was  not  left  in  hell,  neither  his  flesh  did 
see  corruption;   .   .   .   whereof  we   all   are 

76 


The;  Right  o]^  Jesus  to  Re;ign. 

witnesses.  Therefore  being  exalted  to  the 
right  hand  of  God,  he  hath  received  the 
promise  of  the  Father,  and  hath  shed  forth 
that  which  ye  now  see  and  hear."  To  the 
same  purpose  speaks  St.  Paul  in  his  wonder- 
ful discourse  in  the  synagogue  of  Antioch 
in  Pisidia.  He  refers  to  Psa.  ii.  And,  by 
the  way,  he  gives  the  number,  saying  he 
was  quoting  from  the  second  Psalm.  I  sup- 
pose as  he  gives  the  number  the  Psalms 
must  already  have  been  arranged  in  orderly 
form  in  his  day.  He  quotes  from  the  second 
Psalm  the  words,  ''Thou  art  my  Son ;  this 
day  have  I  begotten  thee,"  and  declares  that 
the  psalm  was  fulfilled  not  when  the  Babe  of 
Bethlehem  rested  in  the  Virgin  mother's 
arms,  but  when  the  crucified  Son  of  man 
was  raised  from  the  dead.  He  puts  forth 
the  same  idea  in  the  first  chapter  of  the 
Epistle  to  the  Romans,  where  he  says  of 
Jesus  that  he  was  "declared  to  be  the  Son 
of  God  with  power,  according  to  the  spirit 

17 


A  Cai.1.  to  Advance). 

of  holiness,  by  the  resurrection  from  the 
dead."  In  harmony  with  the  same  thought 
St.  John  calls  the  risen  Saviour  the  "first  be- 
gotten from  the  dead."  To  the  same  pur- 
pose St.  Peter  speaks  in  his  epistles.  In  fact, 
all  the  apostles  constantly  assume  in  writing 
and  speaking  that  the  Sonship  of  the  Son 
of  man  reached  its  culmination  through  the 
resurrection,  and  that  then  Jesus  won  his 
right  to  wear  a  crown  of  universal  authority 
and  acquired  the  power  to  make  good  his 
claim. 

The  Force  o^  the  Apostolic  Teaching. 

A  little  reflection  upon  the  Scriptures  will 
show  the  force  of  their  teaching.  Suppose 
Jesus  had  not  risen  from  the  dead.  Sup- 
pose we  were  able  to  believe  that  he  was 
God  manifest  in  the  flesh,  and  were  able  to 
follow  the  Apostles'  Creed  up  to  the  point 
where  it  declares  he  was  dead  and  buried; 
but  that  when  we  reached  that  point  we 

78 


The:  Right  oi^  Jksus  to  Rkign. 

should  deny  the  rest  of  the  Creed  and  should 
affirm  that  he  did  not  rise.  Suppose  we 
should  still  cling  to  the  doctrine  of  his 
divinity,  but  should  insist  that  at  his  death 
he  returned  by  some  invisible  route  to  the 
glory  he  had  with  the  Father  before  the 
foundation  of  the  world,  and  left  his  human 
body  forever  behind.  What  would  be  the 
effect  upon  our  faith?  Would  not  such  a 
view  destroy  all  our  hope  in  the  perfectibil- 
ity of  humanity?  Would  we  not  fall  into 
the  error  of  the  early  Gnostics,  who  claimed 
that  matter  would  have  contaminated  his 
spirit,  and  that  therefore  he  possessed  really 
only  a  phantom  humanity?  And  would  we 
not  inevitably,  but  sorrowfully,  infer  that 
our  human  nature  is  so  corrupted  and 
maimed  that  even  a  God  himself  cannot  as- 
sume it  and  carry  it  into  the  heavens  with 
him?  But  when  Jesus  Christ  comes  back 
from  the  dead  our  way,  re-covering  even  the 
physical   form  of  his   humanity,   with  the 

79 


A  Cai,i,  to  Advance. 

print  of  the  nails  in  its  hands  and  the  mark 
of  the  spear  in  its  side,  and  with  that  human 
nature  ascends  and  sits  down  on  the  right 
hand  of  the  Majesty  on  high,  he  proclaimed 
to  all  men  that  there  was  nothing  in  human 
nature  so  essentially  base  that  it  could  not 
come  to  the  highest  place  in  the  universe  and 
sit  down  unabashed  in  the  most  august 
Presence  in  that  lofty  estate.  The  resurrec- 
tion perpetuated  the  incarnation,  and  I 
would  have  you  remember  that  no  one  has 
seen  Jesus  since  his  ascension  who  did  not 
see  him  in  the  form  of  his  glorified  human- 
ity. When  St.  Stephen  saw  him  at  the  time 
of  his  martyrdom  he  said,  "I  see  Jesus 
standing  at  the  right  hand  of  the  Majesty 
on  high;"  mark  the  name,  ''Jesus."  If  he 
had  said,  ''Christ,"  Saul  of  Tarsus,  who  was 
standing  by,  would  have  said  :  "He  is  chang- 
ing his  mind,  he  is  about  to  recant.  He  has 
heretofore  claimed  that  Jesus  had  risen  and 
was  the  Messiah.     But  now  he  affirms  he 

80 


The:  Right  o^  Jesus  to  Reign. 

sees  the  Christ  in  the  heavens,  where  we 
know  the  Messiah  has  always  been,  and 
from  which  he  never  descended  in  the  per- 
son of  the  impostor  Jesus.  Stephen  is  re- 
canting. Let  us  give  him  time,  and  we  shall 
not  need  to  execute  him  for  his  blasphemy." 
But  when  St.  Stephen  says,  "I  see  Jesus" — 
the  man  Jesus — Saul  perceives  that  he  is 
more  firm  in  his  faith  than  ever.  The  first 
martyr  sees  the  man  Jesus,  not  sitting  in 
royal  and  inaccessible  glory,  indifferent  to 
what  is  transpiring  there,  but  he  sees  the 
sympathetic  God-man,  standing  in  an  atti- 
tude of  eager  interest,  like  a  grief-stricken 
parent  bending  over  a  suffering  child.  With 
surpassing  confidence  he  exclaims  in  the  ex- 
tremity of  his  agony,  ''Lord  Jesus,  receive 
my  spirit."  There  could  not  be  a  more  em- 
phatic declaration  of  the  supreme  exaltation 
of  Jesus,  coupled  with  the  undiminished 
humanity  of  a  sympathizing  Saviour.  A 
little  while  afterward  Saul  himself  sees  him, 
6  8i 


A  Cai,!,  to  Advance. 

as  he  is  traveling  on  the  Damascus  road.  An 
unearthly  light  falls  about  him,  and  an  un- 
earthly voice  raises  with  him  a  personal  is- 
sue, saying,  "Saul,  Saul,  why  persecutest 
thou  me?"  He  is  dazed  and  stunned,  but 
staggering  to  his  feet  he  challenges  that 
lofty  Person  in  the  words,  "Who  art  thou, 
Lord?"  The  reply  which  he  receives  does 
not  come  in  terms  of  our  Lord's  majesty,  but 
in  terms  of  his  humiliation.  The  response 
from  heaven  is,  "I  am  Jesus,  whom  thou 
persecutest."  He  is  now  convinced  that 
Jesus  has  indeed  risen  and  entered  into  the 
heavens ;  that  he  is  possessed  of  omnipotence 
and  omniscience,  and  that,  nevertheless,  in 
the  midst  of  his  heavenly  throne  he  identi- 
fies himself  with  his  suffering  disciples  on 
the  earth,  and  feels  in  his  own  person  the 
pains  of  their  persecution  as  if  it  were  his 
own.  This  is  enough  for  Saul.  The  revela- 
tion of  the  risen  Jesus  revolutionizes  his 
life.     In  it  he  sees  that  divine  power  is 

82 


The:  Right  o^  Jesus  to  Reign. 

united  in  Jesus  with  ineffable  tenderness, 
and  that  it  is  put  forth  in  inexpressible  love 
for  the  redemption  of  men.  Henceforth  all 
the  things  which  he  has  accounted  valuable 
are  worthless,  and  the  things  which  he  has 
reckoned  worthless  have  acquired  infinite 
value.  He  feels  that  he  must  put  himself 
absolutely  at  the  disposal  of  the  risen  Lord, 
and  cries  out,  ''What  wilt  thou  have  me  to 
do?"  His  heart  is  broken  by  the  vision  of 
the  human  Jesus  enthroned  on  high.  So 
also  when  St.  John  sees  the  Master  on  the 
island  of  Patmos  he  sees  him  in  his  glorified 
humanity.  His  ascended  Lord  declares  to 
him,  "I  am  he  that  was  dead,  and  am  alive 
again,  and  I  am  alive  for  evermore."  In 
this  glorified  humanity  he  observes  his  Lord 
walking  amid  the  golden  candlesticks  and 
holding  the  seven  stars  in  his  right  hand. 
He  sees  him  concerned,  in  other  words,  in 
the  superintendence  of  his  Church  on  the 
earth.     This  work  absorbs  all  his  infinite 

83 


A  Cai^Iv  to  Advance. 

power.  He  is  not  concerned  with  the  world's 
literatures  nor  its  business  nor  its  commerce 
nor  its  confederations.  His  one  business  is 
the  care  of  the  Church,  with  reference  to  the 
conquest  of  humanity  by  the  saving  power 
of  his  heavenly  grace.  He  is  doing  precise- 
ly what  he  said  that  he  would  do  before  his 
ascension,  when  he,  feeling  the  pulsations  of 
all  power  in  his  hands,  had  commanded  his 
disciples  to  go  into  all  the  world  and  preach 
his  Gospel,  and  had  promised  to  aid  them 
with  the  delivery  of  all  his  power  upon  the 
work  committed  to  their  hands.  Now  in 
his  revelation  to  St.  John  he  demonstrates 
the  fact  that  he  is  fulfilling  his  pledge. 

The  UpIvIi^ting  Power  o^  Christ's 
Personality. 

It  is  thus  we  find  that  every  one  who  has 
seen  him  since  his  ascension  has  seen  him 
with  his  human  nature  not  lessened,  but 
glorified  and  raised  to  the  highest  power. 

84 


The:  Right  of  Jesus  to  Re:ign. 

Wherefore  he  is  able,  seing  he  is  the  foun- 
tain of  an  inexhaustible  and  deathless  life, 
to  create  a  patriarchy  on  the  earth.  He  is 
able  to  lift  humanity  to  the  level  of  a  new 
and  unearthly  type  of  life.  The  citizens  of 
some  ancient  cities  claimed  for  their  urban 
commonwealths  the  presidency  of  a  deity, 
with  whom  they  had  a  corporate  life.  That 
was  a  fiction,  but  in  the  risen  Jesus  that  fic- 
tion becomes  a  parable  of  a  real  and  sublime 
fact.  He  creates  on  earth  a  new  common- 
wealth of  souls,  deriving  its  life  from  cor- 
porate connection  with  himself,  and  expe- 
riencing a  life  of  the  same  quality  as  his 
own.  He  gives  to  his  subjects  in  this  new 
patriarchy  what  may  be  called  "resurrection 
life."  Therefore  they  are  called  the  "chil- 
dren of  the  resurrection."  He  is  able  by 
virtue  of  his  risen  humanity  to  impart  a  life 
to  any  man  and  to  all  men,  which  is  justly 
entitled  to  be  called  eternal  life,  not  with  ref- 
erence to  its  duration  alone,  but  more  espe- 

85 


A  Cai.Iv  to  Advance. 

daily  with  reference  to  its  quality,  which  is 
deriyed  from  the  eternities.  It  is  not  a  life 
manufactured  by  the  imposition  of  a  set  of 
new  principles,  however  lofty,  but  it  is  a  life 
engendered  by  a  life-giving  parenthood, 
eternal  in  the  heavens.  So  St.  Paul  taught 
the  Colossians.  Some  of  them  imagined 
they  were  Christians  by  adopting  a  lot  of 
negative  precepts,  such  as  "touch  not,  taste 
not,  handle  not."  The  apostle  teaches  them 
that  Christian  life  is  not  a  mosaic  made  by 
combining  in  artistic  form  certain  bright  bits 
of  ethital  excellences,  but  that  it  is  a  mys- 
tical life  hid  with  Christ  in  God.  "Where- 
fore," he  exhorts  them,  "if  ye  be  risen  with 
Christ,  seek  those  things  which  are  above, 
where  Christ  sitteth  on  the  right  hand  of 
God."  Set  your  affections  on  things  in 
heaven,  and  not  on  things  on  the  earth,  for 
ye  are  dead,  and  your  life  is  hid  with  Christ 
in  God.  When  he  shall  appear,  we  also 
shall  appear  with  him  in  glory. 

86 


The;  Right  o^  Jesus  to  Re;ign. 

The:  Re;surre:ction  Li^e:  of  Je:sus  as  a 
Type:. 

Consider  also  that  the  resurrection  Hfe  of 
Jesus  is  of  a  deathless  type.  He  raised  the 
little  daughter  of  Jairus,  but  she  died  again. 
He  raised  the  son  of  the  widow  of  Nain,  and 
restored  him  to  his  mother;  but  the  poor 
mother,  perhaps,  at  a  later  day  wept  again 
for  the  departed  son,  and  found  no  wonder- 
working stranger  to  restore  him  to  her.  He 
raised  the  brother  of  the  beloved  sisters  of 
Bethany,  but  only  to  a  transient  life,  and 
later,  it  may  be,  the  bereaved  sisters  cried 
out  again,  "Lord,  if  thou  hadst  been  here 
our  brother  had  not  died."  But  when  he 
raised  himself  from  the  dead  he  rose  to  die 
no  more.  He  is  henceforth  out  of  the  reach 
of  the  powers  of  mortality,  and  he  rose  to 
impart  that  sort  of  life  to  those  who  believe 
in  him  and  are  united  vitally  with  him.  And 
this  is  the  kind  of  life  from  which  the  patri- 

87 


A  Cai.1.  to  Advance. 

archy  over  which  he  reigns  is  made.  It  is 
a  heavenly  citizenship.  So  taught  St.  Paul, 
who  knew  the  meaning  of  citizenship,  and 
felt  a  not  unworthy  pride  in  his  own  Roman 
citizenship.  When  he  was  beaten  and  im- 
prisoned at  Philippi  he  stood  upon  his  rights 
as  a  Roman  citizen,  and  when  the  agitated 
magistrates  Vv^ho  had  beaten  him  uncon- 
demned  undertook  to  send  him  out  privately 
he  refused  to  go  in  any  such  manner,  and 
declared  to  them,  "You  have  beaten  me  un- 
condemned;  being  a  Roman,  you  shall  not 
smuggle  me  out  secretly,  but  come  and  fetch 
me  out."  But  later  in  life,  writing  to  the 
very  Church  born  that  night  through  his 
agonies,  he  declares,  "Our  citizenship  is  in 
heaven,  whence  also  we  look  for  the  Lord  of 
glory,  who  shall  fashion  the  bodies  of  our 
humiliation  according  to  his  own  transfig- 
ured body."  His  citizenship  is  no  longer  at 
Rome,  but  in  the  New  Jerusalem.     Roman 

citizenship  had  been  disappointing  to  him, 

88 


The;  Right  oi?  Jesus  to  Reign. 

but  this  citizenship  had  brought  him  the 
noblest  privileges  and  the  highest  deliver- 
ance. He  had  heavenly  life,  though  he  still 
suffered  in  the  earth.  The  spiritual  life  of 
the  upper  kingdom  is  of  the  same  substance 
as  that  of  the  citizens  of  the  kingdom  who 
still  v^alk  on  the  earth. 

The  Right  oe  Jesus  to  Universai. 
Dominion. 

In  his  pov^er  to  beget  by  the  processes  of 
the  new  birth  a  citizenry  of  this  sort  lies  the 
right  of  Jesus  to  universal  dominion.  He 
has  a  right  to  rule  the  nations  because  he  can 
give  new  life  to  the  nations.  By  force  men 
can  subject  nations  to  their  wills,  but  only 
Jesus  can  regenerate  nations.  Alexander 
conquered  men ;  so  did  Csesar,  and  so  did 
Bonaparte;  but  only  Jesus,  the  risen  Lord, 
can  convert  men.  Therefore  he  only  has  a 
right  to  reign,  for  he  only  can  create  a 
patriarchy. 

89 


A  Cai.1.  to  Advanci:. 

This  patriarchal  rule  Is  not  a  tyranny;  it 
is  the  monarchy  of  love,  the  despotism  of  re» 
deeming  grace.  It  gives  to  men  the  life  for 
which  they  were  intended ;  the  life  designed 
for  them  from  the  foundation  of  the  world. 
So  St.  Paul  teaches  in  the  first  chapter  of 
the  Ephesian  epistle  when  he  says,  "We  are 
predestinated  to  the  adoption  of  sons."  He 
has  no  reference  to  any  predestination  of 
any  personal  election.  I  am  not  going  to 
get  into  a  quarrel  here  with  the  devout  fol- 
lowers of  John  Calvin,  but  if  John  Calvin 
had  truly  understood  the  Ephesian  epistle 
he  would  never  have  rested  his  hard  doc- 
trine of  election  on  that  great  letter  of  the 
apostle  to  the  Gentiles.  In  it  Paul  is  simply 
talking  of  the  fact  that  by  the  redemption 
that  is  in  Jesus  Christ  men  come  into  the 
original  type  of  life  which  God  has  had  in 
view  since  the  world  began,  and  before. 
They  have  come,  he  affirms,  through  Christ 
to  sonship,  to  the  altitude  of  life  designed 

90 


The;  Right  of  Jesus  to  Reign. 

in  creation,  and  to  the  high  end  for  the  ac- 
complishment of  which  the  divine  purpose 
has  never  wavered  and  never  wearied. 

A  characteristic  of  this  new  Hfe  is  that 
it  is  pre-eminently  a  life  of  liberty.  The 
Saviour  said  he  came  to  preach  deliverance 
to  the  captives,  and  again  he  affirmed,  "If 
the  Son  shall  make  you  free,  you  shall  be 
free  indeed."  The  apostle  exhorts  the  Gala- 
tians,  "Let  us  stand  fast  in  the  liberty  where- 
with Christ  hath  made  us  free." 

Liberty  a  Dangerous  Affair. 

Now,  liberty  is  a  dangerous  thing.  The 
w^ord  is  one  easily  perverted,  and  the  thing 
it  names  is  easily  abused.  The  French  dei- 
fied it  and  then  destroyed  it.  But  the  liberty 
with  which  Christ  makes  free  is  always 
wholesome,  purifying,  and  elevating,  and  it 
is  a  blessing  in  which  we  are  to  stand  fast. 
St.  Paul  was  jealous  for  it,  as  he  might  well 
have  been.     When  he  wrote  the  Galatian 

91 


A  Cali.  to  Advance:. 

Christians  the  exhortation  to  which  refer- 
ence has  been  made  he  was  not  sensitive 
about  the  observance  or  nonobservance  of  a 
Httle  rituahstic  ceremony,  but  he  was  reso- 
lutely determined  that  the  springs  of  liberty 
and  life  in  Christ  Jesus  the  Lord  should  not 
be  dammed  up  or  cut  off  by  the  intrusion 
of  any  ritualistic  superstition.  He  was  not 
worrying  himself  over  any  merely  political 
or  bodily  liberty,  but  he  was  profoundly  con- 
cerned for  that  soul  freedom  which  cannot 
be  imprisoned  by  the  thickest  walls  nor  man- 
acled by  the  heaviest  chains.  There  is  a 
bondage  which  no  political  deliverance  can 
cure,  and  there  is  a  freedom  which  no  polit- 
ical power  can  restrain.  When  Christ  gives 
us  freedom  it  is  no  miserable  simulacrum  of 
liberty,  but  a  real  and  royal  freedom  beyond 
the  power  of  tyrants  to  subvert  or  oppress- 
ors to  touch.  Paul  could  not  be  confined  in 
the  camp  of  the  pretorian  guard  nor  incar- 
cerated in  the  walls  of  the  Caesarean  prison. 

92 


The  Right  oi^  Je:sus  to  Re;ign. 

His  citizenship  was  In  heaven,  and  his  free- 
dom was  beyond  the  reach  of  ecclesiastical 
persecutors  or  civil  oppressors.  The  Roman 
emperor  could  banish  John's  body  to  Pat- 
mos,  but  thereby  he  only  exiled  him  from 
Ephesus  to  heaven.  This  I  call  the  freedom 
of  a  son  of  God,  indestructible  and  in- 
vincible. 

One:  Homoge:ni;ous  Brotherhood. 

There  is  another  thing  that  Jesus  imparts 
to  the  citizenry  of  his  kingdom,  and  which 
vindicates  his  right  to  reign.  He  is  able  to 
bind  them  together  in  one  brotherhood. 

The  first  duty  of  government  is  to  make 
homogeneous  its  people,  and  it  is  in  great 
peril  when  it  cannot  accomplish  this  end.  I 
may  say  in  passing  that  herein  is  one  of  the 
greatest  dangers  now  threatening  our  own 
republic.  We  are  getting  far  too  many  peo- 
ple of  divergent  natures  and  variant  pur- 
poses into  our  citizenship,  and  the  first  thing 

93 


•    A  Cai^i,  to  Advance. 

we  know  these  acids  and  alkalies  will  make 
an  explosion;  or,  to  change  the  figure,  we 
are  bringing  together  a  great  many  cold  cur- 
rents and  warm  currents,  which  may  gen- 
erate a  political  tornado.  There  are  blocks 
of  isolated  citizens  who  have  come  to  us 
from  other  shores,  and  have  never  been  fully 
fused  into  the  common  body.  There  are 
classes  living  in  daily  contact  without  daily 
communion  of  spirit,  and  so  we  have  gaping 
chasms  between  excessive  wealth  and  ex- 
treme want.  There  is  lack  of  oneness  in  the 
people,  which  must  be  cured,  or  from  which 
the  greatest  strifes  must  arise. 

But  in  the  government  of  Jesus  there  is 
homogeneity  of  life.  Each  and  all  in  his 
kingdom  are  the  sons  of  God,  and  this  su- 
preme fact  of  sonship  overshadows  all  minor 
distinctions.  Wherefore  St.  Paul,  writing 
to  one  of  the  churches,  says :  "We  know  no 
man  after  the  flesh.  Yea,  though  we  have 
known  Christ  after  the  flesh,  yet  henceforth 

94 


The:  Right  o^  Jesus  to  Reign. 

we  know  him  so  no  more."  We  are  not  to 
imagine  for  a  moment  that  St.  Paul  pro- 
posed to  make  nothing  of  his  earthly  kin- 
ships. In  the  last  chapter  of  his  Epistle  to 
the.  Romans  we  see  him  making  very  much 
of  those  relations.  Nor  is  he  affirming  that 
the  earthly  life  of  Jesus  counted  for  nothing. 
But  he  is  declaring  that  the  exalted  Saviour 
and  the  type  of  life  which  he  imparts  to  his 
followers  by  his  power  as  the  risen  Lord 
overtop  and  eclipse  all  earthly  distinctions. 
It  is  in  accordance  with  this  great  truth  that 
Jesus  is  able  to  bind  together  into  one  great 
spiritual  commonwealth  men  of  all  races  and 
all  conditions,  whether  they  be  Jew  or  Gen- 
tile, bond  or  free,  wise  or  unwise.  And  St. 
Paul  presses  this  idea  even  further  than  the 
boundary  line  of  any  mere  earthly  unity. 
He  writes  to  the  Ephesians  of  a  common- 
wealth extended  from  the  earth  into  the 
heavens,  and  calls  it  the  *'whole  patria  in 
heaven  and  in  earth." 

95 


A  Cai^Iv  to  Advance. 

Fatherhood  and  Brotherhood. 
Herein  lies  the  true  brotherhood  of  man 
and  the  real  Fatherhood  of  God.  We  hear 
men  talking  of  God's  Fatherhood  and  hu- 
man brotherhood  as  if  those  sublime  things 
sprang  from  the  fact  of  creation  alone.  But 
fatherhood  and  brotherhood  are  not  thus 
created.  Common  origin  doesn't  give  broth- 
erhood ;  if  it  were  so  we  should  be  brothers 
to  the  trees  and  brothers  to  the  lower  ani- 
mals, for  God  created  them  and  us.  But  are 
we  akin  to  them?  He  made  the  wild  ass 
and  the  wild  ass's  colt,  but  will  you  acknowl- 
edge fraternal  relations  with  that  family? 
Fatherhood  and  brotherhood,  I  repeat,  do 
not  rest  on  a  common  creation;  they  rest 
in  kinship.  It  is  not  primarily  because  we 
are  all  descended  from  Adam  that  all  men 
are  brothers,  but  rather  that  we  are  all  re- 
deemed in  Christ.  If  we  can  find  a  man  for 
whom  Christ  did  not  die,  we  may  exclude 

96 


The;  Right  of  Jesus  to  Reign. 

him  from  our  brotherly  fellowship  and 
recognition;  but,  however  humble  or  ignor- 
ant or  degraded  one  may  be  for  whom 
Christ  died,  he  may  be  raised  to  sit  with  us 
as  a  brother  beloved  in  the  heavenly  places. 
The  biologist  may  trouble  me  a  good  deal 
about  the  unity  of  the  race,  and  bring  to 
me  many  perplexing  problems,  but  Chris- 
tianity solves  all  these  perplexities  in  the 
universal  redemption  which  Christ  Jesus 
has  provided  for  all  mankind. 

A  gentleman  down  in  my  country  is  at- 
tacking the  doctrine  of  the  unity  of  the  race 
on  the  ground  of  the  great  diversities  of 
form  and  feature  among  men,  declaring  that 
like  begets  like,  and  that  these  variegated 
races  could  not  therefore  have  had  a  com- 
mon origin.  It  has  occurred  to  me,  how- 
ever, that  if  his  principle  is  sound  it  will 
give  us  trouble  when  applied  even  to  persons 
of  the  same  race.  Where  did  all  the  red- 
headed people  come  from  if  like  begets  like, 
7  97 


A  Call  to  Advance:. 

and  Adam  and  Eve  were  black-haired?  or 
what  becomes  of  the  black-haired  people  if 
our  first  parents  were  red-headed?  I  am 
not  going,  at  this  distance  even,  to  say  that 
Adam  was  a  red-headed  man ;  but  I  will  say 
that  when  we  have  magnified  all  the  diver- 
sities, physical  and  other,  which  exist  among 
men,  they  count  for  nothing  when  the  power 
of  Jesus  to  bind  men  together  in  one  is 
brought  to  bear. 

Brothe:rhood  o^  Mankind  in  Je:sus 
Christ. 

It  is  in  Christ  Jesus  we  must  find  the 
brotherhood  of  mankind,  and  it  must  be  by 
the  forces  of  his  redeeming  grace  the  ideal 
of  human  brotherhood  is  realized.  And  I 
may  say  in  this  connection  that  we  must 
make  brothers  of  all  the  nations  of  the  earth, 
or  they  will  presently  be  all  enemies.  The 
nations  are  getting  closer  together  every 
day,  and  if  they  do  not  learn  to  love  each 

98 


The  Right  of  Je;sus  to  Re;ign. 

other  with  a  celestial  love,  surpassing  their 
love  of  money,  ihey  will  presently  fall  to  de- 
vouring each  other  with  earthly  ferocity, 
and  the  weakest  will  go  down  before  the 
strongest,  and  civilization  will  perish  by  a 
sort  of  international  cannibalism.  I  repeat 
it,  the  world  is  getting  very  close  together, 
by  the  processes  of  communication  and 
transportation.  Take,  for  example,  the  bat- 
tle of  New  Orleans  in  the  War  of  1 812.  In 
those  days  communication  was  so  slow  that 
that  battle  was  fought  after  the  treaty  of 
peace  had  been  signed  and  the  war  was 
technically  ended.  "Old  Hickory"  and 
General  Packingham  had  not  found  out  the 
war  was  over.  That  was  only  ninety  years 
ago,  yet  when  the  battle  of  the  allied  Powers 
was  fought  before  the  walls  of  Peking  we 
knew  by  dark  each  day  the  results  of  the 
morning's  fighting — and  we  knew  this  away 
down  in  Georgia  even.  We  knew  the  out- 
come of  the  contest  in  China  quicker  than 

99 


A  Cai.1,  to  Advance. 

we  learned  the  result  of  the  battle  of  Get- 
tysburg, fought  less  than  forty  years  ago. 
You  may  remember  when  Queen  Victoria 
fell  down  the  back  stairs  of  Windsor  Castle, 
a  few  years  ago,  and  sprained  her  ankle,  we 
knew  it  in  America  three  hours  before  it 
happened.  Perhaps  if  the  dispatch  had  been 
sent  on  around  the  world  it  might  have 
reached  the  queen  in  time  to  have  induced 
her  to  go  out  the  front  way,  and  so  have 
avoided  the  accident.  But,  seriously,  the 
ends  of  the  earth  have  come  together,  and 
so  the  world  has  grown  too  small  to  admit 
of  standing  room  for  two  religions.  Mr. 
Jefferson  suggested  the  idea,  and  Mr.  Lin- 
coln more  fully  elaborated  it,  that  this  coun- 
try was  too  small  to  be  partly  a  slaveholding 
territory  and  partly  a  free  territory.  They 
said  it  must  be  all  slave  or  all  free.  Some 
people  doubted  that,  but  I  think  they  have 
changed  their  minds  now.  And  let  me  say 
to   you   that,   to   all   intents   and  purposes, 

100 


The;  Right  of^  Je;sus  to  Rkign. 

Peking  is  closer  to  Washington  at  this  time 
than  was  New  Orleans  fifty  years  ago.  The 
time  has  come  when  the  earth  must  be  all 
pagan  or  all  Christian.  The  world  must  be 
bound  together  in  one  as  the  patriarchy  of 
Jesus  Christ,  or  rolled  together  in  a  bundle 
of  infinite  confusion  and  strife.  Paganism, 
with  its  diseases  and  degradations,  will  cor- 
rupt mankind,  or  Christendom,  with  its 
health-giving  and  life-saving  Gospel,  must 
redeem  mankind. 

Perhaps  we  have  all  been  feeling  that 
leprosy  was  a  danger  from  which  our  coun- 
try was  entirely  exempt,  but  the  leprous 
nations  have  come  close  to  us,  and  so  we 
have  leprosy  in  the  United  States.  There  is 
a  leper  colony  in  Louisiana.  I  saw  twenty- 
two  lepers  in  one  hospital  in  Havana.  I 
ordained  a  leper  to  the  ministry  of  our 
Church  in  Mexico  last  winter,  and  he  is 
there  now  ministering  to  lives  similarly 
bHghted.     The  bubonic  plague  has  arisen 

lOI 


A  Cai.1.  to  Advance:. 

from  its  lair  in  heathendom,  and  stalks 
through  the  Golden  Gate  at  San  Francisco. 
All  that  keeps  it  out  of  all  the  cities  of  this 
great  nation  is  the  power  of  a  medical  sci- 
ence sprung  from  a  Christian  civilization, 
which  is  able  to  restrain  it  on  its  approach. 
And  these  physical  ailments  are  visible  par- 
ables of  moral  contagions  which  issue  from 
heathendom  far  more  fierce  and  fatal.  I 
repeat  it,  therefore,  that  the  world  must  soon 
be  all  pagan  or  all  Christian.  Hence  it  is 
to  the  honor  of  Christ  and  to  the  blessing  of 
men  that  we  speedily  carry  Christianity  to 
all  the  nations  of  the  earth. 

Out  of  all  these  statements  and  arguments 
there  are  several  general  conclusions  to 
which  I  wish  to  call  your  attention. 

Ke:e:ping  the:  Lord  Out  of  His  Rightfui, 
Inhe:ritance:. 

The  first  is  this :  Since  Jesus  Christ  as- 
serts and  makes  good  his  right  to  reign, 

I02 


The:  Right  oi*  Je:sus  to  Reign. 

and  yet  is  dependent  upon  his  Church  for 
the  conquest  of  the  world,  if  we  delay  this 
conquest  we  are  keeping  our  Lord  out  of 
his  rightful  inheritance.  In  the  second 
Psalm  it  is  said,  ''Thou  art  my  Son ;  this  day 
have  I  begotten  thee,"  and  it  is  immediately 
added,  "Ask  of  me,  and  I  will  give  thee  the 
heathen  for  thine  inheritance,  and  the  utter- 
most parts  of  the  earth  for  thy  possession." 
Those  words  carried  the  inheritance  of  the 
Son  of  God  far  beyond  the  limits  set  for  it 
by  the  opinions  prevalent  among  the  Jews. 
Their  teaching  at  best  was  that  "Jacob  was 
his  inheritance."  But  as  the  psalmist 
catches  a  vision  of  the  glory  of  the  eternal 
Son  of  God  he  perceives  that  his  possessions 
rightfully  should  be  extended  to  the  utter- 
most parts  of  the  earth.  In  the  accomplish- 
ment of  the  fulfillment  of  this  promise  the 
honor  of  our  Lord  is  at  stake.  He  has  a 
right  to  his  dominions,  and  we  should  be 
impatient  of  any  delay  in  putting  upon  him 

103 


A  CaIvIv  to  Advance:. 

his  crown.  Indifference  to  this  work  is 
treason,  and  needless  delay  in  its  accom- 
plishment is  infidelity.  Let  any  opponent  of 
foreign  missions,  who  yet  claims  to  be  a 
Christian,  understand  once  for  all  that  by 
his  opposition  to  this  high  and  holy  cause 
he  is  guilty  of  treason,  and  forfeits  his 
rights  in  the  kingdom.  I  mince  no  words 
about  this  matter.  I  have  no  right  to  deal 
with  it  gently.  My  Lord  rebukes  it.  It  is 
inhuman  toward  men  and  insurrectionary 
toward  God. 

But  some  may  ask  of  me,  "Have  I  not  a 
right  to  my  opinion  ?"  I  answer,  "Certainly, 
but  a  right  to  an  opinion  is  one  thing, 
and  a  right  opinion  is  another  and  a  very 
different  thing."  But  this  matter  is  not 
left  for  discussion ;  there  is  no  room  for 
argument  about  it ;  it  is  settled  by  all  the 
teaching  of  Scripture,  and  all  debate  is 
closed  in  the  overwhelming  fact  of  the  res- 
urrection of  our    Lord.     When  the  Lord 

104 


The;  Right  o^  Jdsus  to  Reign. 

Almighty  raised  Jesus  from  the  dead  and 
empowered  him  to  vitaHze  with  heavenly 
life  the  nations  of  the  earth,  and  to  unify 
the  race  in  one  celestial  commonwealth,  he 
gave  him  the  right  to  reign,  and  nobody  has 
a  right  to  detain  his  progress  to  this  throne 
of  world-wide  dominion. 

Inhuman  to  Deny  Beneficent 
Ini^i^uences. 

Moreover,  it  is  inhuman  to  deny  to  the 
nations  the  benevolent  influences  which 
arise  from  the  reign  of  Jesus.  They  are 
entitled  to  the  benefits  of  the  best  govern- 
ment the  world  ever  saw. 

Some  may  imagine  that  one  religion  is 
as  good  for  the  nations  as  another.  So 
some  sentimentalists  teach.  But  the  thought 
is  absolutely  foreign  to  the  Scriptures,  and 
is  in  the  teeth  of  the  great  facts  of  Christian 
history.  There  is  only  one  religion  entitled 
to  a  place  in  this  world,  as  there  is  only  one 

105 


A  CaivI,  to  Advanci:. 

Potentate  entitled  to  rwle  over  the  spirits 
of  men. 

Some  years  ago  I  was  invited  to  the  Con- 
gress of  Religions  which  was  held  in  Chi- 
cago. I  was  even  invited  to  accept  a  vice 
presidency  of  that  Congress,  as  I  suppose 
nearly  every  other  minister  in  the  United 
States  whose  post  office  could  be  found  was 
invited.  When  I  received  the  steel-engraved 
invitation  which  was  sent  me,  in  passing 
from  the  post  office  to  my  home  I  stopped 
to  call  on  Bishop  Haygood,  and  he  asked 
me  what  it  was  I  had.  I  replied,  ''It  is  an 
invitation  to  be  a  vice  president  of  the  Con- 
gress of  Religions  in  Chicago ;  didn't  you 
get  one?"  He  said,  "O  yes,  I  got  one;  but 
I  am  not  going.  Are  you  going?"  I  re- 
plied with  some  emphasis,  "No,  I  am  not 
going ;  I  can't  get  the  right  company.  The 
man  whom  I  wish  to  go  with  me  is  dead." 
He  then  asked  me,  "Whom  do  you  want?" 
And  I  replied,  "I  want  the  old  prophet  who 

1 06 


The  Right  oi^  Jii;sus  to  Reign. 

presided  over  a  Congress  of  Religions  on 
Mount  Carmel  in  the  days  of  Ahab,  espe- 
cially if  he  would  come  and  take  his  knife 
along  with  him."  Now  by  all  this  I  mean 
to  say  that  I  am  not  going  on  the  invitation 
of  a  lot  of  sentimentalists  to  sit  down  with 
an  assembly  of  Buddhists  and  Confucianists 
and  Mohammedans,  and  God  knows  what 
else,  to  confer  about  how  to  save  this  world. 
That  question  is  not  open  for  debate  with 
them.  We  have  no  compromise  to  offer 
them,  nor  conference  to  enter  into  with 
them.  There  is  not  standing  room  enough 
in  our  world  for  two  religions.  Christian- 
ity is  engaged  in  a  war  of  extermination ; 
it  will  have  no  rival,  and  it  will  not  consent 
that  the  dominions  of  its  Lord  shall  be  par- 
celed out  among  a  lot  of  religious  satrapies 
and  superstitious  viceroys. 

This  may  appear  a  harsh  way  of  stating 
the  case,  but  let  us  look  at  it  attentively. 
Suppose  one  of  your  citizens  should  send 

107 


A  Call  to  Advance;. 

his  little  boy  on  some  errand  to  a  neighbor's 
house,  and  the  little  fellow,  trying  to  make 
his  way  back  home,  should  become  confused 
and  lost.  Suppose  a  stranger,  finding  him  in 
his  perplexity,  should  in  the  darkness  mimic 
the  parent's  voice  and  simulate  his  manner, 
and  thus  entice  the  child  away  and  sell  him 
into  bondage.  Would  you  treat  that  act 
with  any  degree  of  toleration?  Would  it 
not  expose  its  perpetrator  to  indictment 
and  punishment  as  a  felon?  It  is  thus  all 
these  false  faiths  have  mimicked  our  Fa- 
ther's voice  and  led  millions  of  his  children 
into  a  bondage  worse  than  death.  It  is  our 
business  to  make  an  ending  of  these  kidnap- 
ing religions  and  rescue  our  Father's 
children. 

We  have  read  of  how  when  Sir  John 
Franklin  was  lost  in  the  arctic  seas  great 
governments  put  at  the  disposal  of  Lady 
Franklin  ships  and  crews  for  the  purpose 
of  finding  him   and  restoring   him  to  his 

1 08 


Thl:  Right  oi*  Jksus  to  Re:ign. 

home ;  but  here  are  milhons  in  the  midst 
of  a  deep  darkness  worse  than  an  arctic 
winter  whom  we  ought  to  rescue,  and  yet 
it  is  supposed  to  be  a  most  extraordinary 
thing  that  a  few  milhons  are  spent  annu- 
ally on  the  rescuing  expeditions  sent  out  by 
our  Boards  of  Foreign  Missions.  The 
French  spent  more  money  in  bombarding 
Tonquin  than  all  the  Christian  Churches 
of  the  world  had  ever  spent  for  the  redemp- 
tion of  China  up  to  that  hour.  The  brewers 
of  Chicago  and  Saint  Louis  have  spent 
more  money  since  the  Spanish-American 
war  in  putting  beer  into  Cuba  than  all  the 
Churches  of  America  have  ever  spent  in 
establishing  Christian  sobriety  there.  When 
Livingstone  was  supposed  to  be  lost  in  Af- 
rica (although  he  didn't  feel  very  lost)  vast 
sums  were  spent  to  find  him;  but  when  all 
Africa  was  lost,  and  had  been  for  centuries, 
some  wise  ones  thought  it  fanatical  extrav- 
agance to  make  an  effort  to  redeem  the 

109 


A  CAi^iy  TO  Advance;. 

kidnaped    children    of    God    in   tHe    Dark 
Continent. 

Thi:  Resurreiction   Power  of  Jesus  is 
.Back  of  the  Missionary  Enterprise.. 

There  is  another  thing  I  wish  to  say: 
back  of  all  this  missionary  enterprise  Is  the 
resurrection  power  of  Jesus,  and  therefore 
it  Is  not  going  to  fail.  When  St.  Paul  had 
made  his  great  argument  for  the  resurrec- 
tion in  his  Epistle  to  the  Corinthians  he 
closed  it  by  saying,  "Therefore,  my  beloved 
brethren,  be  ye  steadfast,  immovable,  al- 
ways abounding  in  the  w^ork  of  the  Lord, 
forasmuch  as  ye  know  that  your  labor  is  not 
in  vain  in  the  Lord."  What  boundless 
power  is  thus  pledged  to  guarantee  the  per- 
manence and  persistence  of  spiritual  forces 
in  our  world!  Back  of  these  missionary 
enterprises  is  the  divine  purpose  of  Father- 
hood and  Sonship  which  has  pulsated 
through  all  history.     That  purpose  of  God 

no 


The;  Right  o^  Jiiisus  to  Reign. 

is  not  going  to  be  abandoned  and  it  is 
not  going  to  fail.  Dynasties  may  fall  and 
empires  may  perish,  but  this  kingdom  of 
Christ  has  come  to  stay.  This  redeeming 
work  will  endure.  No  power  shall  over- 
come it.  No  decay  shall  overtake  it  until 
salvation  is  wrought  throughout  the  earth. 
Some  of  you  have  been  talking  of  ''build- 
ing  empires,"  and  the  phrase  may  have  a 
legitimate  use ;  but  in  the  last  analysis  we 
are  not  building  empires,  we  are  extending 
the  one  universal  kingdom  of  Jesus  Christ. 
We  are  not  erecting  temporary  shelters  to 
protect  the  nations  from  fleeting  showers, 
but  we  are  building  an  everlasting  struc- 
ture in  which  to  inclose  the  nations  in  an 
imperishable  home,  whose  builder  and 
maker  is  God. 

The:  Final  Civii^ization  oi^  this  Wori.d. 

The  final  civilization  of  this  world  is  no 

earthly  organization  nor  worldly  form  of 

III 


A  Cai,Iv  to  Advance:. 

life,  but  an  unearthly  kingdom  imposed 
upon  men  from  the  highest  heavens. 
St.  John  in  Patmos  saw  it,  not  as  a  govern- 
ment arising  in  the  earth  from  the  suffrages 
of  men,  but  as  the  new  Jerusalem  descend- 
ing out  of  the  heavens  by  the  power  of  God. 
He  saw  reigning  over  it  the  King  in  his 
beauty,  clothed  with  an  awful  majesty,  yet 
tenderly  stooping  down  to  wipe  away  the 
tears  from  the  sorrow-stained  cheeks  of 
his  redeemed  children.  And  when  John 
saw  this  vision  of  the  descending  glory, 
with  holy  impatience  he  cried  out,  ''Even 
so,  come.  Lord  Jesus,  and  come  quickly." 
May  we  not  join  in  this  same  fervent  ac- 
clamation as  we  look  to  that  divine  event, 
to  which  from  the  beginning  the  whole 
creation  has  moved? 

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